Tyranny's Disease
by cgner
Summary: Lily intended to spend one night on James's pirate ship and leave with her purse a bit heavier. Now she's stuck on board, which might be less annoying if she could figure out where they were bloody going, if half the crew didn't suspect her of sabotage, and if she weren't falling for the captain. And why on earth is his cat wearing an eye patch?
1. Another Alley

A few orders of business before we get going - I like to get my notes out of the way at the start and then not bother you again unless necessary.

**Notes for Readers**

1. This novel has been completely written and consists of eighteen chapters. Expect a new chapter every Thursday (United States time).

2. This novel is a part of Jily Pirate Fest! Check out the "jily pirate fest" tag on tumblr to find more excellent pirate art and fic. There's also a JPF masterlist link on my tumblr sidebar (I'm fetchalgernon).

3. Check out my FFN profile for links to story materials, including the cover art, story soundtrack, and information about the map.

**Acknowledgments**

1. Thank you, Stefanie and Karaline, for being my fabulous betas/friends! Your work is so, so appreciated. Thank you for telling me I wasn't crazy to take this story where I did, and for noticing whether Lily uses a bookmark.

2. The cover art is by my wonderful, extremely talented friend Zeina, and it depicts a scene from this story. Check her out on tumblr (prongsvssquid) to see more of her excellent art and graphics.

3. Thank you, Andrea, for translating the Latin quote for Part II.

4. This story is dedicated to the Novel Writer Club (Adriana, Allison, Ayesha, Karaline, Katie, Laura, Natalia, and Todd). Aw, man, you guys were with me on this from the start. Thank you so much for your feedback and support during all of my angsting! This one's for you. :)

**Part I**

"For somehow this is tyranny's disease, to trust no friends."  
—Aeschylus

**Chapter One – Another Alley**

Lily peered out around the corner, back flat against the alley wall. Target spotted, she darted back to Sam, who stood a little further into the alley, outside the range of the dim streetlights.

"He's coming," she whispered. "Come on."

Sam grinned. "I'm gonna miss you."

"Shut up and snog me already." Lily flashed him a seductive smile. "Or have you forgotten how?"

Sam's handsome face flipped from amused to enraged, and he shoved Lily up against the wooden building behind her. "Think you can say no to me?" he snarled.

"Stop it!" Lily cried, forcing a few tears into her eyes, just enough to show but not enough to fall.

Sam's rough hand ripped her dress off her shoulder, the thin fabric tearing easily. She pounded her fists against his chest while he swooped in and began laving messy kisses along her neck.

"Sounds to me like you need to work on your seduction skills."

Lily saw him from the corner of her eye, a skinny, dark-haired bloke standing in the entrance to the narrow alley.

James Potter.

Or at least, it certainly looked an awful lot like the picture Lily had seen. He wasn't as tall as Sam. He didn't have half of Sam's muscle. He didn't even have an obvious weapon on him, probably to maintain a low profile. And yet there he stood, leaning one shoulder against the wall of the same building Lily was pressed against and looking terribly matter of fact about things.

Sam flipped him a rude gesture. "Sod off."

"I really have to insist that you leave this woman alone, actually," James said. "Immediately, if you please."

Sam kept Lily pinned with one hand and shot an annoyed look at James. "What are you going to do if I don't, eh?"

"There was an officer just around the block. I'd be happy to fetch him and leave you to his tender mercies."

Sam looked back and forth between Lily and James before finally shoving her aside.

"Don't think I won't find you," Sam sneered. "Now get out of here before I change my mind."

She let her shoulders fold in a little. "Sam, please, be reasonable—"

"I said _go_!"

James offered his arm out to Lily. "It's a lovely evening and I could use some company for a walk. Care to join me, miss?"

Lily threw one last panicked glance at Sam and made a dash for James, pulling her dress up over her bust where it'd been ripped. James eyed her state of partial undress with distaste. He removed his cloak, swung it around Lily, and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, drawing her in close.

She kept quiet until they'd passed a few homes and shops. Except for a few passersby in the distance, and the occasional flicker of a in a window, they walked alone in the small town.

"Thank you," Lily said, with as much depth as she could muster. "He can be very kind, but lately he's been very…."

"Crass? Cruel? Unwilling to listen to no?"

"Essentially."

James still had his arm around her, and it was nice, pretending he really was her hero. They strolled down the cobbled street together and soon reached the boardwalk overlooking the harbor, the candles in the streetlights reflecting back at them in the ocean.

Brest had a quaint charm that Lily had found and admired in many French ports, a calmness lacking in the larger cities, with the ever present tang of sea salt on the air. She'd met new friends here, and some easy marks. But her coinpurse had got too light, and Sam wasn't so foolish as to ask her to stay, especially not when he would be moving on himself soon enough.

"I'm perfectly content to keep walking," James said, "but is there a particular direction we should be heading?"

"Where are _you_ going?" she said, pretending to feign confidence.

"That's rather immaterial, isn't it?"

"I don't think so."

He looked at her with a vague air of concern. "I mean, you're beautiful and all, but we've only just met."

Lily guided them to the fence overlooking the piers, the sleek war ships rocking gently in the harbor tide. A seagull landed on the wooden railing near them and tucked its head under its wing.

"I'm not from here," Lily said.

"I did rather guess by the accent."

"And I don't think I should stay here much longer. Not now, anyway, not after—well."

"Who could blame you for leaving?"

Lily turned in toward him and looked up through her lashes. "You've already done so much for me."

"It was nothing, really," he said, his eyes going wide when she leaned in, her chest pressed against his.

"And I do want to repay you, only there is something more you could do for me…."

"Yes?" he said, a bit breathily.

Lily licked her lips, and he watched them, transfixed.

"Take me on your ship?" she asked.

He stumbled back, his arm dropping off her. "What?"

"You know the people on that ship, don't you?"

She pointed down to the ship closest to the boardwalk. A man and a woman stood clinging to the rails of the deck, visible in the moonlight, waving and hollering at James. One of them whistled loudly, in an impressed sort of way.

"Oh. Er. Yes," James said sheepishly, "I do know them." He slashed his hand through the air at them and they shut up immediately.

"And it only makes sense," Lily continued, a little excited, as though this were only just occurring to her, "that if you're not sticking around, you also work on that ship."

"You've got me there," he said, sounding rather strange.

"Where are you going?"

"Not that I know why it's relevant, but we're headed for Bilbao."

Lily nodded. "Could you—I mean, if it's not too much trouble—only I've a friend in Saint-Nazaire, you see. If I leave Brest, I won't have to worry about Sam, and then…. Saint-Nazaire is on the way to Bilbao, and it's only a day's journey from here."

"Er."

"I can pay you, a little, and I need—I need to get away from Sam." Lily dropped her gaze. "You heard him. He won't leave me alone."

"I suppose not." James still had that funny sort of lilt in his voice, like he couldn't quite believe she was asking him this.

"I can help out on the ship, if you need," she said, letting her voice slip into a plead. "Cooking or cleaning or whatever you need that I can do."

"You want to come on board. With me. The man you just met."

"I don't know what else to do besides leave. Please, as a favor to your fellow countrywoman?"

He rubbed his hair with one hand.

Some pirates leapt at the chance to have a woman on board. James was requiring more persuasion than she'd expected, particularly given his earlier confidence.

"Er," he said, "how much do you think is reasonable for passage to Saint-Nazaire?"

"Oh, I dunno. Forty livre?"

"That's…fine. Yes, I'll bring you on board for that."

"Oh, thank you!" Lily pounced on him and engulfed him in a hug. He let out a faint _oof_ but hugged her back awkwardly. "You're my savior. Thank you so, so much."

"Think nothing of it," he said, trying to regain his composure.

"When is the ship leaving?"

"Well, that's the thing, actually. Er, we're just about to pull anchor."

"Oh. That soon." Lily pursed her lips and pulled them to one side, pretending to deliberate this.

"I'm more than happy to walk you home if you're not ready to leave this instant. I wouldn't abandon you to the streets."

"No, I—he knows where I live, you know. And I—if I have to, I can be ready soon. Yes. Right now, in fact."

"Not that I'm reneging, but I have to ask – don't you need to collect your belongings?"

She pulled his cloak tighter around her shoulders, her voice dropping a pitch. "Not that I have much, but most of my things are…well, at Sam's. And I don't…."

"Oh."

"Yes, _oh_. And I'm—I'm leaving this life behind. If it means not having to see him…. I can easily live in this dress for a few days."

"I suppose."

"Then take me to your ship? I wouldn't want you—well, us—to miss your departure."

"All right, er…."

She smiled, this time genuinely. "Lily."

"A pleasure to meet you, Lily. I'm James."

"James." She linked her arm through his. "It suits you. Very well, then. Take me to your ship, James."

* * *

James's ship didn't fly an obvious pirate flag – in fact, it flew no flag at all, which was what had first drawn Lily's attention to it.

Then Lily had seen him. James Potter, a man wanted by the English government for piracy. She'd found a poster with his face on it barely three months ago in Brighton.

Not that Lily had any intention of turning him in. She hadn't expected to run across a ship full of pirates in a French military port, but she was certainly willing to take advantage of the situation.

A tall, dark-skinned woman leaned over the deck rail and eyed Lily coolly as James led her up the gangway. Lily offered her a meek smile, but the woman's gaze only hardened.

Although James's ship boasted three masts and a sizeable sterncastle, the hulking naval ships of the marina towered over it. Young pirates often dreamed of enormous ships, large enough to hold a crew of hundreds, but Lily knew better, and apparently so did James.

Even after nearly three years, Lily couldn't board a ship without thinking of her mother. Her mum had always gone on about the expansive sails, the sturdy masts, the webbed shrouds – according to her, every ship had its own unique, complex beauty. James's was less elegant than others, but far from simple. Bright red letters along the side of the ship read _The Oddity_.

She frowned—ships tended to have more poetic names—but then hid it and watched James as they stepped off the gangway onto the main deck.

"Attention, everyone," he shouted. "We're taking on a temporary passenger. This is Lily and we're dropping her off at Saint-Nazaire tomorrow night."

Curiously, only a handful of pirates had gathered around them on the deck. By all rights, the deck should have been swarming with people adjusting the riggings and generally scurrying about.

"We're not scheduled to stop in Saint-Nazaire," said the woman who'd glared at Lily. She stood with her legs apart and her arms folded, a bright red scarf pulling her tightly-curled hair back from her face.

"Change of plans, Meadowes," James said easily. "Won't take very long, and Lily here needs a lift."

Lily kept her eyes wide and hands clasped where they hung in front of her, assessing the layout of the ship. Everything seemed fairly standard, except for the lack of more pirates.

"I'm really not sure that that's a good idea, James," said a sandy-haired man. He'd started rolling down his sleeves from where he'd pushed them up around his elbows, but before he could finish, Lily caught sight of long, faded scars running along his forearms. "We've a schedule to keep."

Obviously that was a lie—pirates had no schedules—but Lily kept her mouth in a small half-smile. She had the captain on her side, true. But this was a pirate ship, and she did need the support of the crew.

"Please. I offered to pay," she said earnestly, "and help out on the ship however I can. Only James just saved me from a—well, an unpleasant gentleman, and I'm…." She let herself break off and look down at the deck.

"I'm concerned about her safety." James slid an arm around her shoulders. "I can't leave her here."

Lily threw a grateful look up at him. "Please? I'd be so indebted to all of you."

A broad-shouldered man with a strong jaw unfolded his arms. "I think we can spare one day," he said, with a gentler voice than Lily expected from such a large person.

"Thank you," Lily said.

A dark-eyed blonde grinned at her, dimples forming in her cheeks. She wore her hair in a complicated braid that wrapped around her head, and wore her practical trousers and shirt with more casual elegance than Lily could ever hope to duplicate.

"I hear Saint-Nazaire is lovely," she said.

James nodded after each crew member weighed in, but he tensed almost imperceptibly when he looked to another dark-haired young man, one with a cleanly-lined face that Lily immediately pegged as noble.

The man shrugged, looking bored by the entire affair. "If James thinks it's a good idea, let her stay."

"That's what I like to hear, Sirius." James beamed. "Marlene, can you help Lily stitch up her dress? She had an unfortunate encounter with a very large rat earlier this evening."

"Those rats didn't become goats, did they?" the scarred man asked, eyes narrowing.

James looked confused. "Of course not."

The man gave a thin smile, verging on sad. "Just checking."

In the interest of drawing as little attention to herself as possible, Lily kept her questions to herself.

"Let's set sail, then," James said. "Remus, Sirius, we've got to chart a new course. My cabin, immediately?"

Sirius gave a lazy salute.

James leaned in close before removing his arm from Lily's shoulder. "Marlene will take good care of you."

"Thanks," Lily said, her cheeks unexpectedly heating.

"Come on." A hand tugged at Lily's forearm, and Lily looked away from James to see the friendly blonde. "I'll fix you up."

James waved at Lily as she let herself get dragged to a ladder leading below deck.

"You've got stunning eyes," Marlene said as she started climbing down.

"Er," said Lily. "Thanks."

She followed Marlene down and took a second to let her eyes readjust to the dim lighting. Like most ships, the crew slept on thin mats nestled between the cannons, a personal trunk tucked between each bed and the wall of the ship. A few candles flickered in iron holders along the walls.

Bafflingly, she and Marlene had entered an empty room. If the crew wasn't on the main deck or the gun deck, there were very few places left for them to wait for departure.

Marlene crawled onto one of the beds and began rummaging through her trunk. "You're not as curvy as I am, but I think we can make do. I can find something temporary while we fix up your dress."

Lily removed James's cloak and draped it over a polished cannon, holding up her ripped bodice with one hand.

Marlene turned around holding plain yellow dress and frowned. "You weren't lying about that gentleman."

"I always liked his strength," Lily said, "until…."

"Men," Marlene agreed.

Lily took the dress and smiled in thanks. "James seems all right, though. Er, do you mind?"

Marlene obliged her by turning her back, and Lily gratefully changed out of her broken dress and into Marlene's. She carefully transferred her mokeskin pouch to the new bodice, trying the keep the coins inside from jangling against each other.

The dress sagged around her chest a little, but at least she wasn't on the verge of exposing herself.

Marlene turned back around and raised her eyebrows. "Interested in the captain, are we?"

"He is fit," Lily admitted, adjusting the way the dress draped across her shoulders.

"I'll say."

"I mean, his hair, for one thing."

"Oh, _tell_ me about it. Makes me want to run my fingers through it, you know?"

"Well, I'll only have tonight to seduce him, and all things considered, I'll pass."

"Nothing on you, but I don't think he'd oblige you. He's not the type."

"Then I'll have to keep myself warm, which is perfectly fine by me." Lily made a show of looking around and counting the number of beds surrounding them. "It's all right if you don't have a bed for me, you know. I can sleep on the floor for one night."

"Oh, we've plenty of spares. Don't worry about that."

Lily didn't understand how they could have spares when they only had a few dozen beds, but she couldn't ask without revealing her vast experience with pirate ships.

"That's very generous of you," she said. "And I do appreciate you fighting for James to take me on. I know everyone didn't want to, and I don't want to cause any trouble on board."

"Oh, don't mind Dorcas. She hates everyone, and Remus is just obsessed with punctuality."

Lily smiled. "Well, they don't have to worry. I'll be out of your hair before you know it."

She expected Marlene to go help the crew leave Brest, but instead Marlene dropped onto her bed, brushing what looked like a letter off to the side, and invited Lily to sit on the mat across from her. Marlene settled in and leaned forward, like they were children and Lily was spending the night at Marlene's house.

Marlene was in the middle of a story about haggling over a coat in Brest when Lily felt the ship start moving. How they'd managed it with such a small crew so quickly, she had no idea, and she couldn't think of a good excuse to go up onto the deck and watch them work.

"If you need to leave me to help everyone else," Lily said, "I can manage on my own. I'll just go to sleep."

Marlene waved a hand. "Oh, they're fine without me."

"If you're sure," Lily said uncertainly.

Not long after the ship started its journey, more members of the crew started trickling down from the main deck.

Remus came first, climbing down the ladder with precise steps, and gave Lily a faint smile. "Evening," he said, moving toward the bed next to Lily. "Marlene, James nicked himself and is bleeding all over. Would you mind patching it up? I remain unconvinced by his pleas that he's fine."

At least that explained why Marlene wasn't expected to help out on deck. They were foolish to sail with such a small crew, but not so foolish as to sail without a surgeon.

"Idiot," Marlene said fondly. She hopped to her feet and threw an apologetic look at Lily. "I'll be right back."

She clattered up the ladder, and Lily turned to Remus. He pulled a few neatly-folded shirts out of his trunk and set them precisely on his bed.

"It seems James showed up just in time to save you," he said, not looking at Lily.

"He has impeccable timing."

"I admit, it's not something I've ever accused him of before." Remus bent over to reach into the bottom of his trunk with one arm, nearly sticking his head in his trunk, and frowned.

Lily kept herself from straining her neck to see what he was looking at so intently. "Mathematically speaking, he must be in the right place at the right time at least occasionally."

"True enough." He leaned back to sit on his heels and placed his shirts back in his trunk, as deliberately as he'd removed them. "You're awfully far from home."

"So are you."

"My purpose is a little better defined than yours, I should think. What's drawing you to Saint-Nazaire?"

"I've a friend who'll take me in, at least for a while."

"And then what will you do?"

"I don't know," she said, which was technically true, only not in that particular context. "Sam said he was going to ask me to marry him, but obviously that didn't quite pan out, and now I'm rather without a plan."

His face softened. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"I knew for a while it wasn't going to work out, but I…I didn't want to give up hope. Because he'd always been so kind, and he'd always loved France, but we moved and—well. He changed."

People who'd just had their worlds turned upside-down always needed to explain things, rationalize them in some way. Even more than most, they had a strange affinity for the liberating feeling that came from confiding in people they barely knew and would likely never see again.

Of course, Lily was lying through her teeth, but Remus had unfolded his arms and was looking at her with curiosity, not suspicion.

He smiled. "I'm glad we could be of some assistance."

"I'm so indebted to all of you. I really can't thank you enough."

When she met people like Remus and Marlene, her deception sometimes seemed ill-advised, and misplaced. But she wouldn't know them for long, and besides, they were pirates.

The broad-shouldered man and a new man, a shorter one with watery eyes, found their way down the ladder. While neither man was exactly small, only the first carried his weight well.

"Evening," said the broad-shouldered man, smiling softly. "I'm Caradoc."

"Lily," she said.

"I'm pleased to meet you." He kneeled down on a bed near the ladder and began methodically searching through his trunk.

"Sorry," she said to the shorter one, who stood at the foot of the bed across from Caradoc. "I don't think we've met."

His eyes flicked anxiously between her and Remus. "Peter."

"What's your station on board?"

He shrugged, with an affected air of disinterest. "Sailor."

"How long have you been at that, then?" she asked warmly. "It's very exciting, I should think."

Peter knelt down on his bed and pointedly turned his face away from Lily. "Long enough."

He could have been tired – it was late, after all, and Caradoc had already curled up on his bed. Only Remus was still sitting up with her, and he gave her an apologetic smile.

"I think it's best if we all go to bed," Remus said. "Plenty of work to be done in the morning, and all that."

"Honestly, sleep sounds wonderful," Lily said. "Thank you for your kindness."

"Oh, our pleasure." He started to lie down, but then stopped himself. "I wouldn't normally fuss over these things, only you're sitting on Sirius's bed…."

"Ah. Yes." She climbed to her feet and looked down the row of beds.

"I think you'd be best off in the bed on the other side of me."

Lily nodded. "Anywhere is better than Brest."

* * *

Creeping along the main deck later only confirmed that there was something terribly strange about James's ship. Ropes lay in perfect coils on the deck. The sails shone as white as shells in the moonlight, and the rails showed no signs of bird droppings even after sitting in a harbor all day.

Lily had never seen such an immaculate pirate ship before – they must have been fairly early on in their journey. It was plausible that they'd left from England, but that didn't explain why they'd ported in Brest. It wasn't more than a few days' trip from England, and Lily had seen them come into Brest only the night before. Not to mention most pirates would have avoided a military port at all costs.

Drops of wax from her candle splattered on the cloth she'd wrapped around her hand. She'd had to steal from five ships before she could afford this candle, and she wasn't about to shave off any of it, even the bottom edges to squeeze it into a holder.

She would have run to conserve wax if it wouldn't have put out the flame, and if the candle were capable of hiding the sounds of her footsteps as well as it hid her body. The sound of the ship crashing against the waves covered her tip-toeing, but running on wooden decks tended to be loud enough to attract attention.

Lily glanced up at the crow's nest, where she could see Dorcas profiled against the stars. By process of elimination, Sirius was somewhere on deck—he'd never come down to bed—and James was likely in his cabin, which was probably on this level of the ship.

She sneaked up the stairs to the quartercastle deck instead – no one was likely to be in the navigation room at this hour, and if nothing else she could take some maps and compasses. A good map was worth a few months' room and board if she could find the right buyer. She'd have to go to a bigger port than Saint-Nazaire, but she could sell off a lesser map for passage to the Netherlands, or maybe Spain.

She peered in a small port window – the clear light of the moon fell across a sprawling table covered in maps and charts. No crew members, though.

Lily slowly turned the handle and tugged the door open, just wide enough to slip inside, and pulled it shut behind her.

She blew out her candle and wrapped it in the cloth. After a glance at the door, she withdrew her mokeskin pouch from the bust of her dress and turned it inside-out, dumping the few coins it held on the table. She pulled the drawstring shut, reopened it, and placed the candle inside the now cavernous pouch. Once she'd reversed it again, she dropped her coins back in and shoved it back in her dress.

At first glance, the maps on the table seemed to be fairly standard profiles of the French coast. Nothing to get excited about. A few more rolled up maps in the corner looked promising, or…. A cabinet, that was better. People liked to put valuable maps away until they needed them.

Lily strode over to the narrow cabinet in the corner and tugged at the door.

It didn't give.

Her mouth curved into a smile. She pulled a hairpin out from her bun, slipped it into the lock, and after a quick twist, the door sprung open.

She reached inside—

"I hoped I'd be the one to catch you."

Lily spun around, folding the hairpin into her palm, her heart trying to leap from her chest.

Sirius lounged against the open door, a smug grin on his face. "I asked for the graveyard shift, in fact, once James told me he didn't trust you. I don't take kindly to women taking advantage of my best mate, you see."

"What do you mean, catch me?" She frowned. "I'm only looking around – couldn't sleep. I don't get many opportunities to wander around ships. I think they're fascinating."

"I saw you go into that cabinet."

"So? I'm a little nosy, my mother always said so. It's just a cabinet."

Sirius arched an eyebrow. "That cabinet was locked."

Lily mentally cursed, her palms sweating. He had several inches on her and plenty more muscle—no sword, though, which meant if she could get to her pouch quickly enough…. Lying still seemed the most viable option for the moment.

"Was it?" She glanced back at the cabinet door in feigned confusion. "Maybe someone forgot to lock it. It opened fine for me."

He beckoned her closer. "Then what've you got in your hand?"

She couldn't drop her hairpin, not without him seeing, and saying she wasn't holding anything was beyond idiotic.

"It's just a hairpin," she said dismissively, and she shoved it up into her hair among her other pins before he had taken a step forward.

He marched across the room to tower over her. "Give it to me."

"It's _mine_. You've no right to it."

"I'll rip them all out of your hair if you don't give it to me."

"Sirius," James called.

Lily leaned sideways to see him standing in the doorway, arms folded over his chest.

"You know, I thought we'd covered the difference between threatening and summoning," James said, exasperated. "Do we need to go over it again?"

Sirius brushed a lock of hair out of his eyes. "Where's the fun in summoning?"

James sighed. "Come on, Lily. To my cabin."


	2. Parley

**Chapter Two – Parley **

Not much distinguished the captain's cabin from other ships Lily had been on. The same rear-facing windows, dark woods, and ornate trim decorated the room, all warmly lit up in candlelight gold. An alcoved bench built into the ship served as a cozy reading nook near the windows. At least, Lily would have used it as a reading nook, and James certainly had more books on his shelves than most of the captains she'd encountered. Clothes hung haphazardly on the chairs around the table in the middle of the room, and Lily couldn't see the top of the desk for all the parchment strewn over it.

She took it all in absently, mind otherwise occupied devising reasons for being in the navigation room. She'd been caught, but she could still salvage the situation.

She stood by the door while James grabbed a chair from the table and swung it around to sit backwards on it.

"Your crew is terribly rude," she said, putting on an affronted look, "threatening to attack me like that—"

"Oh, do tell," he said, resting his elbows on the back of the chair, "what excuse would you like to offer up? Sleepwalking? Looking for the loo?"

"I was only looking around, and then your—whatever his position is—"

"Navigator."

"—yes, him, started hurling accusations my way."

"No," James corrected, "you were sneaking. You already played me false once with that man in the alley."

"How _dare_ you—"

"I'm rather disinclined to trust witches who lie their way onto my ship."

Lily's heart hammered against her chest. "I can be unkind on occasion," she said, "but _witch_—"

"Don't play the fool," he said sharply. "That cabinet was magically locked."

It was possible, of course, that the cabinet had been magically locked. Her hairpin opened any lock, Muggle or magical, and gave no indication either way.

"Which means," he continued, "that your hairpin is something special. A magical item, in fact, and you must be a witch."

If their cabinet was magically locked, at least that meant they were witches and wizards themselves, and not witch-fearing Muggles. Probably.

"There's no need for name-calling," she said, just in case.

"The thing is, Lily, you saw our ship. No one sees my ship. Unless…." He raised his eyebrows.

Oh. _Oh_. She'd been so stupid. The ship had some sort of spell on it to hide it from Muggles.

Habit encouraged her to keep lying, to pretend she was some naïve Muggle-born who didn't know what she was, but that seemed futile and pointless.

She crossed her arms over her chest. "It's not like I knew you were _magical_ pirates."

He quirked his lips. "Oh, of course not."

"I didn't, though."

"You know, there's this funny thing that happens when you start out lying, where your integrity gets entirely ruined." He stood up from his chair and walked over to look out the window. "So, Lily, if that is your name, what were you intending to do on my ship? Presumably more than gain passage to Saint-Nazaire."

She pressed her lips together. She wouldn't incriminate herself, even to fellow thieves. There were penalties for stealing from pirates, harsher and more immediate ones than any governmental system would condemn her to. But they didn't have much proof of a crime at the moment – all she'd done was break into a cabinet.

"Let's try this," James said, turning back to her. "You're from England, yes?"

"Yes," she said, voice curt.

"Are you actually trying to get to Saint-Nazaire?"

"I am."

"Why?"

"I've a friend who's offered to put me up for a while. I needed passage."

"You're lying, actually," he said with confidence, strolling toward her. "If that were the case, you could've gone with any old ship. No, you wanted passage on my ship specifically. But where I get lost is why."

Lily lifted her chin as he stopped in front of her. "I don't have to answer to you."

"You're not obligated to do anything, true. But you are stuck on my ship and I'm not planning to go to Saint-Nazaire."

Stuck on his ship was promising – stuck was at least alive.

"Then where will you drop me off?" she asked.

He slanted a grin at her. "Who said I was dropping you off?"

"What, you want me to follow around your crew indefinitely?"

"The thing is, Lily, I can't just let you walk away."

Hopefully that was not a reference to cutting off her legs.

"Why _not_?" she said.

He grinned, in the way Lily imagined the devil would, cocksure and triumphant. "Because. As you so accurately deduced, I'm a pirate."

Indefinite imprisonment seemed a strange way for magical pirates to handle a simple matter of thievery, but Lily had nothing to compare it against. Neither Sev's magic lessons nor her mother's pirate lessons had ever covered magical pirate codes. She hadn't even known there was such a thing as magical pirates.

Still, even if she didn't know their punishments, there was one aspect of piracy that surely even magical pirates followed.

"In that case, Captain Potter, I would like to invoke the right of parley."

He nodded slowly, mulling it over. "What would you want in this parley? Passage to Saint-Nazaire?"

"I'm not fussed where you drop me off, but I'd obviously like to get off this ship sooner rather than later."

"I suppose that's an easy enough request."

"And what do you want in return?"

"Nothing much, really. I want you to tell me the truth about who you are and why you're on my ship."

"That's it? I can tell you that now, and you can still make Saint-Nazaire by tomorrow night."

"The problem is, I won't know if you're telling the truth or not. I don't have Veritaserum on board and you've proven yourself adept at lying."

"For parley I'll tell the truth."

"See, you clearly don't understand trust. It's a crucial element in any productive relationship. You've already lost mine, so how can I _know_ you're telling the truth?"

Lily let out a short breath. "Then how can I earn your trust so you'll believe me so I can get off your ship?"

He shrugged. "I suppose it'll just take time."

"Time."

"Yes."

"How long, exactly?"

"I'm sure I don't know."

That wasn't much of a parley, if he got to arbitrarily determine when she'd fulfilled her end of the bargain. But he could've asked for lashings as punishment for her crime, or worse.

If this was the bargain she was getting into, she only had to make the terms starkly clear. Her mum had taken every opportunity to negotiate with Lily, tricking her into eating her vegetables or into revising her lessons.

"So you propose," Lily said, "to keep me on your ship until such a time as you trust me to tell you the truth about why I boarded your ship, at which point you'll drop me off at the next major European port in full health with my current effects."

"Well," he said, drawing out the word.

"Well, what?"

"If the truth turns out to be something I dislike, then I'm afraid I won't be dropping you off."

"So I have to earn your trust, convince you I'm telling the truth, and then you _might_ let me go?"

"What can I say," he said, that smug grin still stretched across his face, "I'm a pirate."

Admittedly there wasn't any good argument to that, but at least she'd be safe temporarily. Provided he was a man of his word, anyway.

"But you won't lock me up in the meantime?" she said.

"If you misbehave I will."

"And what counts as misbehaving?"

A smile played across his lips. "Oh, I'll know it when I see it."

"You're _enjoying_ this."

"A beautiful woman lies her way onto my ship and then I have to keep her around? Yeah," he said, "I am."

His blasé attitude made her palm want to connect forcefully with his face, but she reminded herself that his terms were actually quite favorable.

Although he did seem to be willing to let her look like an idiot in front of the crew.

"Why did you let me on when you knew I was a witch?" she asked.

"You would've fooled me if it hadn't been for the Muggle-repelling charms," he said. "I let you on because I wanted to see what would happen. I needed to see if you were a threat, and if so…."

"What are you afraid I'll do, exactly?"

"Frankly, I think you're here to sabotage my ship."

"And why would I do that?"

His eyes roved over her from head to toe, assessing, not leering. "You tell me."

"That doesn't—you're impossible."

"_I_ don't have to prove anything. You've already proven you've got ulterior motives. I just need to know what they are before I decide what to do with you."

He wasn't being entirely unreasonable, but it still grated that she'd walked into a trap. She'd always expected to get caught eventually, true. And she had been caught wandering around on other ships before, but she'd always been able to lie her way through an excuse. This particular situation was…unanticipated.

There was only the chance to make the best of it.

"So I'll be given room and board at your expense until you free me," she said.

"Naturally. Although I wouldn't mind if you paid the amount we agreed upon for passage to Saint- Nazaire."

"And if I don't?"

"Well, to be honest, I'm already going to take everything you own, most of which will get returned to you if I free you. It's really just a matter of whether you give it willingly or not."

Her nails dug into her arms where they remained folded across her chest. "_If_ you free me."

"I make no promises. If you're here to do what I think you are, then I'm definitely not letting you go."

"If I _were_ going to sabotage your ship—which I'm not—wouldn't it make sense to just kill me before I get the chance?"

"Would you like me to kill you?"

Lily arched an eyebrow at him.

"As I thought," he said. "And I would prefer, all things equal, _not_ to kill you, so I'm glad we're in agreement on that. Honestly, I think there's a good chance you're telling the truth, that you aren't here for sabotage, but I can't know for sure until I trust you."

She bit her lip to keep from saying something she'd regret.

"Look, I'm taking a risk here, too, you know," he added. "I'm not being as harsh as I could – like you said, I could just kill you now. I'd rather not, and I'd love to trust you, but I've got plenty of reasons to believe there are magical saboteurs searching for me and my ship."

"Which are?"

"Either you already know and there's no point in telling you, or you don't know, which is how I prefer things anyway."

All Lily had to do was prove she wasn't a saboteur, an easy enough task considering it was the truth. She had to be able to get them to trust her within a couple weeks at the outside. During that time they'd probably take port somewhere, depending on where they were going, and she could try to escape if things were moving too slowly.

"Where is your crew headed?" she asked. "Only I'd like to get a general sense of direction so I can think about upcoming ports and where you might drop me off."

"You'll figure it out, I'm sure, clever girl like you."

"Perfect. Thanks."

He stepped around her and she turned in place to keep an eye on him, but he only reached for the door.

"If you're going to stay on board," he said, "you could help out, you know. You did offer to cook and clean."

"I'm really not very good at either," she said, which was not a lie.

"Fair enough." He opened the door. "Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to finally go to sleep. I'll have Sirius wake Marlene to check you over for your belongings."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I did say I'd take everything from you. It's not meant to be humiliating. It's just a precautionary measure, in case you have other magical items that might help you with whatever your mission may or may not be."

His only crime was not being an idiot, but that was a small comfort in the face of effective imprisonment.

"And of course," he said, holding out his palm, "I'll need all your hairpins before you go."

* * *

In the morning James had Lily stay in his cabin while he addressed the crew. She fidgeted in Marlene's dress and tapped her fingers on the table. All night she'd tried to think of a way to escape, but nothing reasonable had come to mind.

"You're the one who betrayed our trust," Sirius said, much too smug for Lily's liking. "No need to look so sour."

"It's not that," she said flatly. "It's my time of the month." It wasn't true, but it did make Sirius look away uncomfortably, and she smirked.

The door opened and, of all things, a cat wandered in.

A cat with wild orange fur and an eye patch.

Lily's mouth opened, and then closed.

"I had to hide him last night," James told Lily as he followed the cat through the door. He'd donned a worn three-corner hat, tufts of hair sticking out underneath. "He can't defend himself like the others."

"You didn't find a wand on me, if you recall," she said. "What sort of threat could I be?"

"We'll have to find out, won't we?" He grinned. "This is Algernon, by the way."

"Your cat is wearing an eye patch," Lily felt compelled to point out.

"He is! Although he's none too pleased about it."

Algernon strutted over to Lily and plopped down on the ground in front of her, his face tilted up, expectant.

"Hello, there." She lowered her palm in offering, and Algernon sniffed it twice before licking it. "You're harmless, aren't you?" She petted his ears, and he purred quietly.

"Oh, sure," James told his cat, "get revenge on me by befriending our enemy. Don't think I can't see right through your plans, Algernon. Your psychological tricks won't work on me."

For lack of other options, Lily looked to Sirius for confirmation that James was a lunatic. But Sirius was watching James intently, an eager, almost pleased look on his face.

"Right," she said slowly. "In any case, I thought of an addendum to our parley last night – I won't take part in any raids you might make while I'm on board."

"Wouldn't dream of it," James said.

Sirius snorted. "Aren't you a generous captain."

"I mean it," Lily said. "I don't want to get involved."

"Trust me." James picked up a piece of parchment from the table. "I've got more important things on my mind than raiding any random ship we come across."

There were very few things that would lure pirates away from raiding, but it didn't really matter since she would hopefully be off the ship soon enough.

"Anyway, you're released from my cabin," James told her. "Everyone's been properly warned about you now."

"Yes, I'm certain they're now properly afraid of an unarmed witch. Thanks for that."

"Oh, I'm sure you can be plenty dangerous if you want."

She gave him a mocking salute and wandered out onto the deck, preening a little in the sunlight. There were few pleasures as lovely as the warm sea air whipping overhead, the thick, clean smell of salt on the wind.

Near the front of the main deck, Dorcas walked alongside the rail, the tip of her wand hovering just above the wood. She looked blankly at Lily when she walked by. "I told him to kill you."

Lily's hand twitched, eager to grab her mokeskin pouch—but Marlene had confiscated it. The only weapons on board were wands, by the look of it, and those were all but useless to Lily.

She pressed her lips together and walked on. "Thanks for your vote of confidence."

James had given her free rein on board and she didn't have to stand by and listen to idle threats. Unfortunately there was nowhere else to go, really. Normally at this stage of the trip, she'd have several valuables tucked in her mokeskin pouch and would spend the day further befriending the crew, lest they suspect any ulterior motives. But now she'd been caught, and with such a skeletal crew, everyone was occupied.

There was nothing to do but explore, particularly if she was going to be confined to the ship for an indefinite amount of time.

She'd already seen the gun deck and most of the main deck—although she did want another look at the library between the main deck and James's cabin—and she was plenty familiar with the navigation room.

Together that comprised the majority of the ship. She had no interest in the orlop deck—it wasn't worth crawling around the bottom of the ship if she had nowhere to store anything valuable she found—which left the room at the front of the ship, under the foremast. If nothing else it would offer the best view of where the ship was headed.

She didn't look out the windows when she entered, though, her eyes instead drawn to Caradoc. He stood with his wand outstretched, directing a parade of dishes through the air and onto a long wooden table.

"Good morning." He smiled, keeping his eyes on the silverware. "Breakfast's almost ready. Oi, to the left, now," he gently scolded a recalcitrant fork. Chastened, the fork budged over into perfect alignment with the knife and spoon next to the plate.

Lily stood mesmerized for a moment at his casual use of magic, the way the plates hung effortlessly in the air. Her heart twinged in jealousy.

She glanced at the table, and then at the door. "Should I…."

"Oh, you're more than welcome to join us." The last fork settled into place and Caradoc looked up at her. "I'd hate for you to eat alone."

"Thanks," she said, her voice coming out more uncertainly than she'd intended.

"I'll be back in a moment," Caradoc said.

Lily nodded, unsure what else to do, and he disappeared out onto the main deck.

She hadn't seen anything like this room on other ships. Then again, most other ships barely had enough space for the crew to sleep and eat – this ship had the luxury of a room clearly designed for lounging.

Most of the windows faced out onto the ocean ahead of them – they were headed southwest by the look of it. A few rays of sunlight streaked across the room from the porthole windows, falling on top of the cozy sofa and chairs nestled in front of the main windows, the back of the sofa dividing the sitting and dining areas. Bookshelves lined the walls, filled with trinkets and books and bottles of liquor, all apparently magically restrained to keep from falling off in the rocking of the waves.

Lily wandered over to examine the book titles and let her fingers trail along the tops of the spines, all dust-free. She'd only got through one row when she heard footsteps approaching the room. She turned to see Marlene stroll through the door and smile at Lily.

"Plenty of time for books later." Marlene slid into a chair at the table. "Come on, Caradoc's just on his way up."

Lily chose a seat next to Marlene and offered a weak smile. Marlene didn't seem to be outraged that Lily had lied to her, and Lily wasn't about to turn down another friendly face.

The door opened again, and this time Dorcas marched in. She took one look at Lily sitting at the table, scowled, and spun around to leave.

But she ran into Remus in the doorway.

"Not joining us for breakfast?" he asked.

Dorcas scoffed and waited for Remus to move. When he did, she stomped back out onto the main deck.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake." Marlene pushed back her chair and chased after Dorcas.

Remus smiled at her as she passed and joined Lily at the table. "You understand, I'm sure."

"The impulse to kill strangers? No, I never caught that illness, fortunately."

"I take it she told you what she told James."

Lily gave him a wry grin. "It was the first thing out of her mouth when she saw me."

"Well, you've got to give her points for transparency."

Peter poked his head into the room. "Is breakfast ready?"

"Nearly," Remus said. "Caradoc will have it up in a moment."

Peter sat next to Remus and muttered something to him, inaudible to Lily. She looked away, pretending they weren't so obviously talking about her.

Dorcas stepped through the door once more, her arms folded tightly over her chest. Marlene came through right behind her wearing a fond smile, one hand pushing Dorcas forward. She released Dorcas at the head of the table, far away from Lily, and nudged her toward the chair. Dorcas dropped into the seat and pointedly looked anywhere but at Lily.

Marlene retook her seat next to Lily and leaned in toward Lily, hushed and apologetic. "I told Dorcas if you tried anything really dangerous, she could kill you."

Lily's stomach turned. Hearing it from Dorcas was—well, it seemed like something she'd do. But Marlene had seemed nice.

"She's funny that way," Marlene added thoughtfully.

"Did James agree to that?"

"Oh, it wouldn't matter. He needs us and if you're dead, you're dead. No coming back from that. But it'll be fine. I didn't think you'd try to kill us. And now you've got extra incentive not to, I suppose."

Lily was spared from having to reply by Caradoc's entrance. Platters heaped high with bacon and eggs floated through the air behind him, a happy procession of food that flowed around Caradoc and onto the table. They landed with a small clatter, and Caradoc smiled.

"Happy breakfast," he said, sitting on the other side of Lily.

Which brought Lily to having two allies, three if James was included in the group of People Who Didn't Want to Kill Lily. Or maybe he brought it to two and a half, since Marlene would let Dorcas kill her under the right circumstances.

Silence reigned while everyone served themselves, Dorcas still ignoring Lily, and Peter glancing at both women nervously.

"So," Lily said, half to break the awkward silence and half out of hope. "Where are we headed?"

Dorcas slanted a savage glance at Lily.

"I'm afraid we're not permitted to share that information," Remus said.

"Ah." Lily shoved a forkful of egg into her mouth.

"But I'm sure I speak for the group," Remus said, "when I ask who _you_ are, Lily."

"Oh, I'm no one, really. Just a—" She didn't think of herself as much of anything besides a person, and she'd never explicitly told anyone what she did before. Sam and everyone else she'd got to know in her brief stays in cities had recognized a fellow thief immediately. "I'm a simple English girl who finds her way onto a surprising number of pirate ships and walks away finding that somehow something valuable has fallen into my possession."

"You're a thief," Peter ventured.

"Pirate," Dorcas muttered.

Lily ignored her and nodded at Peter instead.

Marlene sipped her juice, a strange orange one that didn't smell familiar to Lily. "That's a bit of a dangerous job, isn't it?"

"Only if you get caught," Lily said.

Remus raised his eyebrows. "And you have."

"But luckily for you," Marlene said cheerfully, "we don't make people walk the plank around here."

Peter looked vaguely upset over this, which made Lily all the more grateful that at least half of the crew didn't want to kill her. Although one person wishing her dead was really one too many.

Remus gave Marlene a mischievous smile. "Not anymore, we don't."

Marlene threw her head back and laughed.

Lily wasn't cut out for a full-on pirate life. She could never laugh about killing someone.

She focused on her plate, lest she provide them justification for reinstituting the plank, and savored the eggs and bacon. Muggle pirate ships relied on much less elegant food and drink, but with magic they could keep food from spoiling. And on top of the fresher supplies, Caradoc seemed to be an excellent cook. A quiet one, too – he hadn't spoken since the others had joined them, although he appeared to be following the thread of conversation.

"Oh, _yes,_" Marlene said. "I'll never forget the splash he made."

Remus sighed, much too happily, in Lily's opinion.

"Enough with the reminiscing," Dorcas said sharply, although she ruined it by smirking. "Brilliant as that day was."

By the feel of it, the eggs in Lily's stomach had suddenly gone off. She ducked her head down and poked at her food.

As the others ate, Dorcas began barking out directives for the day about the maintenance they needed to perform on the ship. Some of the instructions sounded familiar, about tacking and decks and sails, but other terms were entirely new. They sounded like magic, which explained how they managed with such a skeletal crew.

"Do you have anything that Lily might do?" Remus asked. "James requested she help out if possible."

Lily scowled.

"She is _not_ to touch my ship," Dorcas said.

"Very well. It's your call," Remus said. "Sorry, Lily."

"No complaints from me."

Dorcas nodded. "Then everyone else, get to work."

"As she said," Remus told the group.

Everyone pushed back from their seats and began filing out the door. Caradoc served up two plates, presumably for Sirius and James, and handed one to Dorcas and one to Peter.

Lily stayed in her seat for lack of a better option, and soon only she and Caradoc were left.

"Can I help you at all?" she asked. "Dorcas only said not to touch the ship."

"Oh, no, I'm fine. Thank you for offering."

Lily nodded, and with a lift of Caradoc's wand, all the dishes lifted up again and trailed him out the door.

She tapped her fingers on the table, alone once more and with no clear objective in sight. Even doing dishes would have been better than sitting around aimlessly.

She sighed and went back to inspect the bookcase. Everyone else might have left her, but books would always be there.

* * *

Lily sat curled up on the sofa, an anthology of Aristophanes's plays in hand, when James and his cat strolled in a couple hours later. She could have ignored him him—she was enjoying _Lysistrata_ much more as an adult than when her mother had read it to her—but she was, perforce, trying to win him over.

"I see you've settled in for a holiday," he said.

"Dorcas has forbidden me from touching her ship." Lily marked her place in the book with her finger as he stopped behind the sofa. "So I'm going to let the two of you sort that out."

"You could clean the deck without being much threat."

"I don't know about that. I am an enormous threat, per your own determination."

"And per my own determination you're perfectly capable of simple tasks."

"I could be completely useless for all you know. My skills lie in areas other than domestic work."

"Yes, I did notice."

His cat had sat down on the ground and was pushing at his eye patch with a paw. She nearly reached down to help him take it off, but surely even James, slightly mad as he might seem, had a reason for putting an eye patch on his cat.

James leaned forward, resting his hands on the back of the sofa. "I'd like you to join me for dinner tonight."

"And I'd like to get off this ship. Trade you?"

"Not really a trade so much as a request."

"I can't imagine why you'd want to dine with a dangerous woman like myself. I might accidentally kill you."

"Well, I figure I'm the one who really needs to trust you, and how better to get to know you than over dinner?"

Lily raised an eyebrow. "You just think I'm beautiful."

"It's true, that's certainly a perk," he mused. "Much better than looking at Sirius over the table. I think he chews with his mouth open to spite his parents, even when they're not around."

"I'd prefer to eat with the crew, even if it means more threats from Dorcas."

"I'm sure you would."

But he looked at her expectantly, and she sighed.

"I'd be happy to join you," she said through a forced smile.

"You know, blatantly lying is really not doing much to make me trust you."

Lily dropped her smile. "In that case I'll be there despite how I feel about it."

"As I thought."

After he and Algernon had left, Lily set down the book on the table in front of her and moved to stand near the windows. They'd tacked another direction now, but they were still moving southwest.

James could be going a variety of places: the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, Africa, India. If it were anything but the first, they'd have to take port at least once before they reached their destination. Unless, of course, they really did have that many supplies on board thanks to magic. But surely magical pirates needed time on land as much as the next person, and they'd stop for a change of pace eventually, regardless of their supplies.

At least she hoped as much. She'd have no chance of escape until they stopped.

Which meant, of course, that she had to work on alternate methods in the meantime, and the only real option was to convince James and the crew to trust her.

By and large, pirates were very single-minded. Some were brutal, ruthless in their ambition for gold and silver and women, their ships often on the brink of yet another mutiny. Other pirates followed very strict codes of honor and behavior; they still raided ships and sacked cities, but they would only kill as a last resort.

So far James and his crew seemed to fall into the latter category, but they didn't quite fit there, not with the callous way they'd joked about the plank, or about letting Dorcas kill Lily.

Besides Dorcas, everyone else seemed decent enough on the surface. Then again, Lily had only just met them and had no idea what sorts of sordid things they'd done as a crew in the past. These were the first wizards she'd been in prolonged contact with besides Severus. Maybe having magical powers gave most witches and wizards some sort of superiority complex. Sev had never been that way, but he might have been the exception.

Regardless, Lily needed to convince them she wasn't a threat, and at least she didn't have to convince everyone. Caradoc and Marlene seemed to be on her side already. Remus and James didn't trust her but they didn't seem to mind her, either. Peter and Sirius had made their dislike clear, and Dorcas wanted her dead.

That really wasn't too dire a situation, death threats aside. She was never going to persuade Dorcas to care for her, but she could probably win over James and Remus. James thought she was pretty, and Remus at least seemed to respect her.

Tempted as she was to sit and read in the sun, she had more important things to do.


	3. Still Not a Saboteur

**Chapter Three – Still Not a Saboteur **

Lily stepped out onto the main deck in search of Remus, but she only saw Marlene standing on the quarterdeck and, curiously, James up in the crow's nest.

Captains didn't typically take on lookout duties, but then again, captains didn't normally operate with such small crews. James had six watch shifts and six crew members, excluding the cook. He could have asked someone to take two shifts, like many of the pirate captains Lily had met would have, but he hadn't.

Lily crossed the deck to check the library, but when she tried to enter, the handle didn't give.

She would have climbed down the ladder to look for him if Dorcas weren't sleeping on the gun deck, so instead she scaled the stairs to Marlene, who stood with one hand on the helm, the other casting spells at the sails.

Lily smiled. "Hi."

"Hi. Getting bored yet?"

"I am well on the way."

Marlene sighed, although it seemed a little put-on. "Shame you lied to us, or you could have helped out."

"Not really. I don't have a wand."

"Could've borrowed one? Yeah, I dunno. Seems a shame to miss out on the additional help."

"I'm also clueless how to make a ship run with magic."

Marlene finished a spell that adjusted a system of ropes and pocketed her wand. "Oh, anyone can learn. We did, didn't we?"

"Presumably." Lily couldn't admit to being vastly inexperienced with magic, so she said, "James wasn't at breakfast. Does he normally eat by himself?"

Marlene leaned backwards against the helm. "Yeah. Thinks it's captain-like to give us our space."

"Apparently he's lonely in his own space – he invited me to dine with him tonight."

Marlene's face lit up and she stood upright again. "You should dress up!"

Lily frowned. "Why?"

"Because it's fun?"

The dresses Lily's parents had forced her into when they'd entertained guests had been useless for running about and climbing trees. Lily had always proudly come back to the servants with ripped hems and grass stains.

But personal preferences were not the priority at the moment.

"Well, is James going to dress up?" Lily asked.

"He's always dressed up a bit."

He did have a finer shirt than the rest of the crew, and no one else wore a hat.

If she dressed up, he could take it as a sign that she was trying to do what he wanted. Which might show that she had no ill intentions, or show that she was trying to manipulate him.

Of course, she was trying to manipulate him into trusting her. But only because he was making her.

Lily sighed. "Will he be happier if I dress up?"

"Well, you'd be prettier to look at, if nothing else."

"He did mention that I'm better to look at than Sirius."

Marlene laughed. "That's true enough. We'll find you something to wear after lunch, before I go to bed."

"Didn't you sleep all night?"

"No, I did some work after you—well. Normally I take the graveyard shift here but James wanted…you know."

James hadn't just been prepared for her to wander about – he'd encouraged it by reducing the number of people on duty, the snake.

"Sirius mentioned something to the crew," Marlene said, "only he won't ask, he's too bloody proud, but I'm not – how did you get into the navigation room without anyone seeing you? Sirius said he watched the deck for you, but you just showed up in the room, and we've warded the boat with Anti-Apparition spells."

Lily bit back a smile. "I'm actually a ghost."

"Possible, except I think we've already disproved that one."

"Figment of your imagination?"

"We haven't been at sea nearly long enough for that yet, and even if we had, I hope we'd have a more exciting mass delusion than you. No offense."

"What do you think?"

"Well, Sirius reckons you're an Animagus."

Lily hesitated. "I'm not familiar with that spell."

"How can you not know what an Animagus is?"

"What can I say, my education focused more on classic literature than spells."

Marlene's eyes flicked up and down Lily. "Where did you go to school, exactly?"

"I've only ever had governesses," Lily said truthfully, neglecting to mention none of them had been for teaching her magic.

"Oh." All hints of suspicion dropped off of Marlene's face, and were replaced by something closer to pity. "Are you like…well, I know seeing magical things doesn't mean you've got…I mean, you didn't go to Hogwarts."

Lily lifted her chin, her hands finding their way to her hips. "Not for a lack of invitation, thank you very much."

"That's a shame. That you didn't go, I mean. I think we'd have been there around the same time. Before."

"Before…."

"Before You Know Who," Marlene said, as if it were obvious. "He Who Must Not Be Named."

"Is that one of those voodoo pirate things? Because voodoo has always seemed unnecessarily complicated for magic, at least what I've heard about it from other pirates."

"How can you not—" Marlene narrowed her eyes. "Wait, are you taking the mickey again?"

"About _what_?"

Marlene cocked her head. "You've really no idea what I'm talking about, do you?"

"How could I when you haven't even told me the name of the person we're discussing? What's so special about him that he _mustn't be named_?"

"But—where have you _been_ the last two years?

"Around." Lily crossed her arms over her chest. "It's not easy making a living these days."

Marlene stared at her for a few moments, apparently unable to fathom that Lily wouldn't know someone who didn't appear to have an actual name. Then comprehension dawned on her face. "Hang on a minute—are your parents Muggles?"

Sev had told her not to tell people she was a Muggle-born witch, which she'd assumed was more about revealing her magic than her heritage. But the way Marlene asked about her parents….

"No," Lily lied.

"But then…you don't know who You Know Who is," Marlene said, forehead wrinkling.

"That's a bloody stupid name. Do people call him that to his face?"

"That's not his _name_. You just can't say it or—but how do you not know this if you're not Muggle-born?"

"I don't know," Lily hedged. "I've been busy."

"You know, it's all right if you are Muggle-born. We're not—well, we're not You Know Who."

"Well, I'm not."

"But really. I mean. Are you lying? Either you're a very, very good saboteur, or you're completely ignorant."

"Oi, I'm not _completely _ignorant."

"But you _are_." Marlene reached out and adjusted the helm with one hand. "I mean, you don't know anything, do you?"

"I know loads of things, thank you."

"But nothing—I mean, how can you be—I suppose if you've been pirating the past few years—when did you start that?"

"But you already—how did you know I've been gone for two years?" Lily asked suspiciously.

"I didn't. But you started two years ago?"

"What of it?"

Marlene's lips pressed together. "That's awfully convenient timing."

"With _what_?"

Marlene didn't answer right away, instead sizing Lily up. "Well, if you really are that ignorant, then I'm definitely not afraid of you."

"Oi, I can be plenty dangerous. That is, I'm not going to hurt you, but I can handle myself. I've fought off pirates before."

"But you're not dangerous. At least, not the way we care about. I'd better not say anything more."

"Why not?" Lily demanded.

"Because if it's a trick, then I'm not falling for it. And if it's not a trick, well."

"Well?"

Marlene smiled, sad and humorless. "If it's not a trick, I don't want to have to be the one to tell you."

* * *

Lunch was a no more comfortable affair than breakfast. Although Dorcas had gone to bed after breakfast, Sirius had just woken up.

"You're still here?" he said, eyeing her coolly.

"Suicide hasn't presented itself as a favorable option yet, but you're making me rethink that."

"Excellent news."

But after Marlene had shoved down more chicken than Lily had thought one woman could consume, she dragged Lily below deck to rummage through her trunk, grinning eagerly. She outfitted Lily in a deep blue dress made of some satin-type material—Petunia had always cared more for clothing than Lily had—that swirled around her feet when she turned.

Lily left Marlene to sleep and wandered back up to the main deck, where she spotted James behind the helm, his shirt hanging open around his collar as he cast spell after spell at his ship. Peter had taken up watch in the crow's nest, and Lily went to give the library another go.

But when she tried the handle, it remained locked. She hadn't had time to attempt anything else before the door opened in front of her.

"Did you need something?" Remus stood in the doorway, hand still on the handle.

"Only a reprieve from boredom."

Algernon darted out from the library and wound his way around Lily's legs.

"He is fond of you, isn't he," Remus said.

"He is," Lily said, glancing up at the helm above Remus's head, "and so's Algernon."

Remus bit back a smile. "Care to join me in the common room?"

"If you like," Lily said, although she didn't quite understand where he meant. But she followed him across the deck to what she'd started thinking of as the dining room.

"Chess?" Remus asked once they had entered.

Lily grinned. "Oh, yes, please."

They quickly lost themselves in a game set up on the dining table, sunlight streaming in through the windows behind her. They played in silence at first, gauging the other's strategy, but fortunately the quiet didn't last more than a handful of moves.

"You're quite talented," Remus said, eyes on the board. Algernon sat curled up on his lap, purring contentedly, his tail flicking.

"You're a worthy opponent," Lily said, trying to read Remus's expression. He didn't appear to be an emotive man, though, at least not when he actively tried to hide it.

"Who taught you?"

"My father. You?"

"The same." Remus smiled a little. "He always called it the game of kings."

"Chess isn't the game of kings – it's the game of those who have the king's ear."

"An interesting perspective."

"But I will give you that it is the king of games."

He slanted a grin at her. "I can see why he likes you. I'm speaking of Algernon, of course."

"Of course," Lily said, the corners of her mouth twitching.

She hadn't played chess in months – most pirates didn't care for it, aside from the odd captain or first mate. She'd missed it, in a way. She'd spent hours playing with her father as a child, tucked up in a corner of their two-storey high library, staring at the board in frustration as her father bested her over and over again, encouraging her to try harder.

"Does he know what you do for a living?" Remus finally moving a pawn forward. "Your father, that is."

Lily's gaze dropped to the board. "No."

"Then again, I suppose he might not mind, depending on what his profession is."

"Was," she corrected. Although it had been years, her heart still twinged at the admission. "And he might've cared but he can't now."

She moved a knight and risked a glance up at him. He had a knowing sort of look on his face, and Lily averted her eyes and shook her head a little.

"But that's years ago now," she said. "What about your parents?"

"Oh, well, my father used to work for the Ministry, in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures."

"Before," Lily said, trying to copy Marlene's inflection.

He nodded. "As you might expect, the department's taken a bit of a turn recently, and not precisely in the manner he favors."

Lily had a hundred questions about the wizarding world and what had happened that was so significant to warrant _Before_, capitalized and stressed, but whatever it was, she couldn't risk asking too many things without apparently exposing that she was Muggle-born. She still didn't know where Sev was, or why he'd gone, but his final letter had been explicitly clear.

So she nodded back at Remus and smiled sympathetically. "Is he doing something else now, then?"

"He's tried to find work in the Muggle world, but the only exposure he's had to Muggles has been through my mum and her family. But I wouldn't say the transition has been entirely successful. He went out in one of her dresses once."

"Oh, dear."

"With one of her hats and everything."

"The dress I can see, but the hat?"

"Well, he thought it was a matched set, you see. And in fairness, she did always wear them together in good company."

Lily smiled and moved her knight, while Algernon stood up on Remus's lap, stretched, and dropped elegantly onto the ground.

"Tired of me already?" Remus asked him.

Lily wondered if everyone on board spoke to the cat naturally, or if that was all James's influence.

Algernon ignored him and strolled toward the door. Lily didn't understand, at first, what Algernon was planning to do. But then the door magically swung open for him when he approached, allowing him out onto the deck.

And Lily had an idea.

* * *

When Lily tried the library door that evening, it opened easily. She took her time walking across the room to James's cabin – she'd barely had a moment to inspect it the previous night when James had marched her through.

Shelves lined every inch of wall, all overflowing with parchments and books and detritus. Rays from the evening sun filtered through the lace curtains on the windows, casting long shadows over the table in the center of the room.

As she moved closer to James's cabin, she could hear his muffled voice through the door, probably talking to his cat. But when he opened the door a minute later, Algernon was nowhere in sight.

She reminded herself she was trying to win him over, and smiled.

James smiled back and let his eyes dart up and down. "You look really lovely," he said, stepping back to let her through.

"Thank you." She strolled past him and glanced around the room. It looked as it had the night before, only now platters piled high with food covered the table, with place settings for two squeezed in between. He'd tidied up a little, at least removing the clothes from the chairs, but he'd only tossed them in a pile in the corner.

"I didn't know we had that dress on board."

"I suspect you're not personally responsible for the female clothing inventory."

"And just as well I'm not. Please, sit down."

"Thank you." She adjusted her skirts as she lowered herself into the chair, holding her shoulders back and her neck high. She could turn on the standard courtesies when it suited her; there just weren't many instances where she bothered.

But for her freedom, she'd play the lady as much as needed.

He remained standing and picked up a dark bottle from the table. "Wine?"

She smiled, one of the demure ones her father had taught her. "Please."

James poured wine into two goblets, ending with a flourish, and held one out to her.

She took it and graced him with another smile, this one mischievous. "Are you trying to seduce me?"

His mouth curved up at one end. "Would you like me to?"

"A lady never says."

He laughed a little, mostly to himself. "For the moment I'm only trying to seduce you into giving me your secrets."

"Pity," she said lightly, and took a sip of wine. It was surprisingly well chosen for a pirate, a good match for the food in front of them.

He lowered himself into the seat across from her. "I'm sorry I had to take you prisoner."

"I find that hard to believe, based on your own comments."

"All right," he said, grinning, "so it's a little fun having someone new on my ship."

He picked up a napkin and draped it over his lap, and Lily followed suit.

"You know," she said, "I do understand why you did what you did. You've got to protect your crew."

He raised his eyebrows, both in approval and, if she wasn't mistaken, a bit of surprise. "I'm glad we're in agreement about something, at least."

"But I hope you'll trust me before too long. I'm not interested in the full pirate life."

"Do you mean to say you're half a pirate? And, if so, which half?"

"I'm not any sort of pirate, really. I only came on board to, hm, reappropriate some of your items for myself."

"Is that so." He picked up his knife and fork. "What were you going to take from me, then? Anything in particular, or whatever struck your fancy?"

"Whatever small valuables I could find. Not everything, just a handful of select items."

"And that's all you intended to do, is it?"

She nearly shrugged, but that wasn't ladylike. Instead she lifted her chin, just a little. "A woman's got to make a living somehow."

"That's a very peculiar brand of piracy you've got there."

"I'm not a _pirate_. Not really."

"You just said you steal from ships. In my world that's the very definition of piracy."

Lily served herself from the dinner platters. "I don't think so. I imagine piracy as having some element of violence to it, and I didn't attack you. I would never hurt anyone unless they attacked me first."

He cocked his head. "But if you'd actually stolen from me, I probably would've taken that as license to attack you."

"The people I steal from don't have to hurt me. They could just turn me into the Royal Navy. If they choose a violent path, then that's on them."

"If they choose to use less than lawful methods, you might still be short a hand, even if you're their moral superior."

"Except I'm very good, aren't I? You're the first to catch me, and it seems—although it might be premature—that I'll walk away with a full complement of limbs. You've no actual intention of hurting me, unless, I imagine, I hurt you or your crew first."

They looked evenly at each other for a moment, a silent challenge, and James looked away first. He finished serving himself and began to eat.

She repressed a sigh. She probably hadn't come off as particularly endearing or trustworthy. Debating the morality of their respective lines of work wasn't likely to get her anywhere, but she couldn't let a pirate judge her without arguing.

"While I don't agree with you," he said thoughtfully, pointing at her with his fork, a piece of fish dangling precariously on the end, "that was well articulated."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "I'm not an idiot."

"I gathered."

"So that's me," she said dismissively. "Common thief, not someone working for What's His Face."

"You Know Who," he corrected.

Lily stabbed a carrot with her fork. "Yes, Marlene told me about his idiotic names."

"She did mention you had a curious lack of knowledge regarding recent events."

"Well, I've been in England a grand total of three days in nearly as many years."

It wasn't that Lily didn't want to know what they were talking about—she did, if only because Marlene had spoken of it so gravely—but James already had the upper hand. She wouldn't very well bare her ignorance to him and give him more leeway.

"And you've no contact with anyone in England?" he asked. "No one at all?"

"No."

She'd been to England but not home. She'd considered writing a letter to Petunia, once, but she'd never managed to find the words she needed.

"You're very strange," he told her.

"I'm not the one with an eye patch on his cat."

"That's with good reason. But either you're a very good saboteur—"

"Or I'm just terribly unlucky, yes, I know."

He tapped a finger where it held his knife. "I was _going_ to say an uneducated witch who's playing pirate, and has no idea who You Know Who is or what's going on in wizarding affairs."

"I could call you equally uneducated. Just because I don't know what you know doesn't mean I don't know anything."

"Sorry, not generally uneducated, but in the things that you should know. Non-academic things, I should say. No, you're plenty clever, but I can't help but wonder…are you Muggle-born? Marlene told me you say you aren't, but I'm finding that hard to believe."

She tried not to let her shoulders tense and focused on cutting another piece of fish. "I don't see how my parents are relevant."

"See, if you _were_ a saboteur, I think you'd have a backstory planned out better than that."

"What?"

"Well, you wouldn't just outright deny being Muggle-born. That only makes me suspicious."

"I'm really not following."

"No." He picked up his cup of wine. "I really don't think you are."

"As your dinner guest, I'd appreciate it if we could discuss something else."

"Not yet, and since I'm the captain," he said apologetically. "It's all right, you know, if you're Muggle-born. You're in good company. Not that I am, but Caradoc's Muggle-born, and Peter and Remus are half-bloods."

It wasn't that she didn't believe him—he seemed genuine, just like Marlene had—but she still trusted Sev over all of them.

"But," James said, tilting his head, "if you _are_ Muggle-born, why would you feel the need to hide it? Unless you _were_ aware of recent events, that is."

Lily raised an eyebrow at him. If he wouldn't tell her everything, she wasn't obligated to do the same.

"You're a very confusing person," he concluded.

"I'm not the one insisting I remain on this ship, I might remind you. You can drop me off in any port. Any one at all, and I'd be more than happy to stop perplexing you."

He grinned. "I won't be dropping you off quite yet."

"You're a very annoying person," she retorted.

"Only because I'm demanding simple answers, like who are you and what do you want. Nothing much, really, in the scheme of things."

"Did I or did I not already tell you why I came on board? I'm certain I did. I was there for it."

"We've covered what you want, yes, but not who you _are_."

"Weren't you just telling me you didn't care if I was Muggle-born?"

"Not your blood I'm worried about so much as your character. How can I trust what you want if I don't know who you are?"

"I'm not a bad person," she offered. "Isn't that all you need to know?"

"Did you or did you not confess to making a living stealing from others? Funny, in my book that's not under the definition of _good person_."

"Ah, but I only take from pirates like yourself, so they've no right to the items in the first place."

"A thief of thieves? Oh, I do like that. But couldn't you just make an honest living?"

"Too dull," she said, the closest thing to a lie she'd told him besides the self-protective one about her blood status.

His eager smile wilted. "You're doing this for _fun_."

A disbelieving laugh escaped her. "I don't know where you think you get off judging me. There's only one pirate in the room and it certainly isn't me."

James leaned back in his seat, his half-finished plate still in front of him, and linked his hands behind his head. "You still haven't convinced me you're not one, but your point is well taken. Still doesn't lift your own burden, though, or make you a good person if I'm a worse one. By your standards, of course."

"I think it matters if you're judging _me_. Let's not forget who's part of a group known for pillaging ships and villages."

"I wasn't aware thieves ranked higher than pirates on the morality scale. Aren't we doing the same thing to different people?"

Of course, she was only slightly morally better than a pirate, and she only considered this the case because pirates didn't take one or two valuables, they took everything.

But she wouldn't convince him, and that was fine. That wasn't the objective for the evening anyway. Not that she appeared to have made much progress on that front, either.

He watched her with keen, laughing eyes, waiting for her next volley, and she sighed.

"You know," she said, "I can't help but feel I'm not fostering trust."

He smiled, a curious, knowing sort of smile. It was too close to smug for Lily to appreciate it. "You are persuading me to trust you, but not in the way you think you are."

He thought she was confusing, but obviously he'd never stopped to listen to himself.

"I don't know how to convince you to trust me," she said.

"It goes both ways, you know. It's very obvious you don't trust me or my crew, when we've given you no reason to distrust us, whereas you've proved you're plenty clever and a practiced liar. By your own admission you're a criminal."

Lily scoffed. "No reason? Are you forgetting you let me on board knowing full well I was lying and then arranged circumstances so I would still try to steal from you?"

"That was a _reactionary_ lie. Not even a full lie. Or any lie, technically. A misrepresentation at worst."

"Not to mention your crew threatened me."

"Oh, Dorcas?" He laughed, short and deep. "Don't mind her."

"Except I do mind, actually."

"You're under the protection of parley and, more importantly, my word. I wouldn't worry about it."

Clearly it was no matter to him that his crew were beyond his control. And he wondered why Lily didn't fully trust him.

"So this dinner was pointless," she said. "You still don't trust me and I'm still stuck here."

"Oh, no, I wouldn't say it was _pointless_. I thought it was fun to talk about this sort of thing. Maybe you didn't."

It had been entertaining – certainly much more engaging and challenging than the conversations she'd had in the past several months. She couldn't admit to that, though.

"You said I'd have free rein of the ship," she told him.

"And?"

"The door to the library was locked earlier."

"Oh, yeah. That'll be Peter working."

"Well, what if I want to use the library?"

James quirked his eyebrows. "Wait until he's not working."

"I don't understand why he and I can't both use the room at the same time. It's not exactly a cupboard."

"Sorry," he said insincerely. "He's got things to do and I don't want you anywhere near them."

Lily sat up a little straighter. "So it's important, what he's doing."

"Nah, we just like locking Peter up."

"So kind, you are."

"Pirate," he reminded her.

She pretended to fume about her restricted access so she could have a moment to concentrate on her surroundings. In all likelihood, James had kept her effects in his cabin. She hadn't tried his door when he wasn't occupying it, but if he hadn't already been magically locking it, he probably was now. But hopefully her loophole wouldn't have occurred to him yet.

"So you're reneging on our parley," she said, after she'd had a good look around.

"Not reneging. Amending. You did it yourself this morning."

"Fair enough," she said grudgingly.

Once more he'd reasoned her into a corner with no hope of appeal. She nodded absently while he invited her back for dinner the next night, and subtly dropped a piece of fish into her lap.

He might have got her on their agreement, but it didn't matter. Soon enough she'd have free rein, or close to it, despite him.

* * *

James took the latest shift in the crow's nest, from after dinner until midnight, and Lily spotted Peter in the common room, playing dice and drinking with Marlene and Caradoc – if she was going to try to reclaim her belongings, she wouldn't have a better chance.

They probably thought she was no threat at all, wandless and without her hairpin, but her mum hadn't been a pirate for nothing. She'd instilled in her daughter the ability to pick basic locks. _In case you're ever kidnapped because of your father_, she'd said, a mischievous gleam in her eye.

Lily tried to use a normal hairpin on James's door, but as expected, it failed. He'd locked it with magic, and she had no way around that.

But James clearly hadn't designed the ship with the intention of holding people captive.

She stood next to the door to his cabin, her bit of fish in hand, and said softly, "Algernon! Oi, Algernon! You beautiful thing, I brought you something."

She heard a gentle thud through the door, and then nothing.

"Come here," she said, a bit louder. "I've got a bit of fish here for you because you're such a magnificent, gorgeous cat who has a lunatic of an owner."

The door swung open, and Lily jumped back to avoid it smacking into her face. She wasn't quick enough, though, and it whacked her foot. She cursed and hopped onto her other foot, but still had enough sense to grab the door handle before it shut again.

"Come on," she told Algernon, and limped into James's cabin.

Algernon followed, golden eyes fixed on her hand.

The door snicked shut behind them, and Lily lowered herself into a chair at James's table, the horizon behind her as dark as irises.

"Here you go," she said, holding out her palm to Algernon. "Because you're such a good cat."

He darted forward and licked the fish off her hand, rough tongue brushing against her skin, and then retreated, eyeing Lily cautiously.

"I'm not going to get into any trouble," she told him. "And I'm definitely not going to hurt James, so calm down, all right?"

She checked the drawers under the reading alcove and found nothing but clothes and spellbooks. Tempted though she was to borrow the one on potions, she left them alone. Instead she rummaged through his desk drawers, hurriedly opening them and pressing her hand against the bottoms to test for false panels.

Algernon had hopped up onto the reading nook and curled up in a ball, tail flicking while he watched Lily poke around the room.

She found her effects in one of the drawers under James's bed, lying next to a small mirror and a curious golden ball with tiny, delicate wings. She traded out her hairpin for one she'd borrowed from Marlene and opened her pouch. As best she could tell they hadn't figured out how to find the true contents, although interestingly all of her coins were still in the Muggle side.

She picked up the dagger her friend Miguel had given her during her brief stint as a pirate, but her hand stilled before she took it out of the pouch. If someone caught her with a weapon, they'd be suspicious of her motives, and of how she'd managed to sneak it past them. She reluctantly nestled it back in her pouch beside the necklace her parents had given her on her tenth birthday, and allowed herself a brief caress of the pendant before removing her candle.

There was nowhere safe to stow her candle. If any of the crew mistook it for a regular candle, they could burn through it without even realizing its powers. But if she was going to search the ship for information without the crew knowing, and if she was going to try to escape at some point, she'd need the candle. She tucked it into her bodice along with a box of matches, and converted the bag back to the Muggle side.

She dropped her pouch back in the drawer and stood up, closing the drawer with her foot.

"Algernon," she called sweetly. "Would you mind escorting me back into the library?"

Algernon looked at her sourly.

"Come on," she pleaded. "I don't want to break the spells."

But he remained unconvinced.

"Please? Look, I only took back what was rightfully mine. And you saw, it's nothing dangerous. A candle and a hairpin, honestly. I'm not going to take over the world with that."

He slowly stood up in his spot, and Lily beamed.

"Yes, see?" she added. "I'm really not intending anything awful. I just wanted my own things back."

Algernon leapt off the bench and trotted over to her.

"I'll steal you some bacon at breakfast," she said, in a sing-song voice.

He purred, happier than she'd heard him yet, and sprang over to the door.

It opened at his presence, of course, and Lily smiled at him. James might not have come around to her, but she'd manage without him.

And if his cat liked her better than him, well, that was just a bonus.


	4. You Know Who

**Chapter Four – You Know Who**

Every four hours marked a shift change on board, and the crew rotated between working, sleeping, and leisure time, with meals slotted in where possible. The closest Lily came to seeing the whole crew at once was at breakfast and lunch, where everyone save James and whoever was sleeping at the time sat down in the common room together.

"Excellent breakfast," Marlene told Caradoc through a mouthful of bread.

Caradoc smiled. "Thank you."

"McKinnon, you left your book in the crow's nest," Sirius said, as though this were of no significance.

Dorcas's gaze snapped up from her plate to Marlene. "You had a _book_ in the crow's nest?"

Marlene's eyes briefly narrowed at Sirius before looking down at her plate. "It's so _boring_ up there. What am I supposed to do?"

"Keep _watch_."

"I saw nothing – isn't that what really matters?"

"No."

"Well, sorry."

Peter ducked his head, leaning halfway over his plate, while a line formed in Caradoc's forehead and Lily watched silently. Perhaps Dorcas was being a bit harsh about it, but reading in the crow's nest did seem to defeat the purpose of being up there.

Fortunately Dorcas didn't reach for her wand, instead attacking her food.

The line vanished from Caradoc's face, and Peter sat up again.

"If you're going to break the rules," Sirius said, pointing at Marlene with his fork, "at least read something more interesting than _Amortension_."

"I _like_ that book," Marlene said hotly. "Just because I want to read something fun and not the most depressing literature in existence doesn't mean—"

"My books aren't _depressing_, they're _deep_—"

Dorcas pounded a fist on the table. "No one cares about your stupid books," she said with an air of finality. "So long as it's not in the crow's nest."

Marlene and Sirius glared at each other and went back to their breakfast.

"I liked _Amortension_," Caradoc said. "I found it very engaging."

Sirius looked at Caradoc, his eyebrows drawing together. He opened his mouth, closed it, and then burst out laughing.

"Oh, it's fine for _Caradoc_ to read it," Marlene muttered into her teacup. "That's _funny_, but if _I _like the characters…."

"And you." Dorcas turned to Peter. "Are you making progress?"

He hunched over his food again. "Er, some."

"How much?"

"Er, I can't really measure it…."

Dorcas gave him a firm look of disapproval.

"I'm trying," Peter pleaded.

Lily opened her mouth to tell Dorcas to back off—she had no clue what they were talking about, but Peter looked ready to curl up in a ball—but Dorcas pointedly turned back to her food.

"Try harder," she said.

"Which character did you like best in _Amortension_?" Caradoc asked Marlene.

"The main character, obviously," she said. "You've got to respect a woman who can brew _Amortentia _from memory using that many substitutions."

"She is a talented poitioneer…."

Lily stopped listening to their book discussion and looked around the table instead. Peter morosely ate his eggs while Sirius cheerfully buttered another slice of bread. Dorcas whispered something in his ear, and he laughed.

After Dorcas had leaned away from him, he glanced around the table, and his eyes found Lily's.

Few people could look as handsome as he did while smiling, much less with a disdainful curl of the lip, but somehow he pulled it off.

Lily stretched her mouth into a huge smile, just to annoy him. He let his eyes roll around in contempt and went back to his food.

"Sirius," Dorcas snapped, "check the riggings and sails."

"Pray tell," Sirius said, "what have I done to deserve such a scornful tone?"

Her thin mouth hinted at a smile. "You're a snitch."

"Ah, but only for the right cause."

She forced the smile off her face and turned to Marlene. "Inspect the orlop deck."

"Aye aye." Marlene beamed inexplicably.

During her brief stint as a real pirate, Lily had always traded shifts with other people to avoid crawling around in the narrow bottom of the ship.

But she understood better later when she followed Marlene down below the gun deck. They descended into darkness, like climbing into a well. When Marlene reached the bottom of the ladder, she cast a spell to light a candle on the wall near her, setting off a chain reaction. Several feet down another candle lit up, and then another, forming a shining row of advancing light down the wall. The reaction didn't stop until the lights had come full circle around the room.

They'd spelled the deck in a way Lily had only ever heard about, where the room had more space than it properly should have. The deck spanned more than the entire length of the ship, all one sprawling room, except for one metal wall with a door at the far end. In between the door and Lily stood row after row of shelving, packed tight with labeled boxes, jars, and bottles, all eerily lit by the candles.

Lily's stomach flipped. With all these materials, she might be trapped on board for months before they needed to take port somewhere.

"Follow me around if you like." Marlene unpinned a piece of parchment from the wall. "It's probably best if you don't touch anything, though."

Lily sighed and nodded. It was still better than sitting around and doing nothing.

"Not that _I_ think you're here to mess everything up," Marlene hastened to add. "But just, you know, if something goes wrong, let's make sure you look plenty innocent, all right?"

"I'll _be_ innocent, which should be the most important thing."

"And it will be, but—well, Dorcas."

"And Sirius."

"And Peter," Marlene said sourly.

"But you're still in the majority, so that counts for something, right?"

"Less than you might think. But I really don't think they'll kill you without a trial or something first."

"Oh, thanks. I'll just go start chatting with Dorcas now – obviously I've nothing to be afraid of. You're an immense comfort in my time of distress."

"I do what I can." Marlene looked at the list and began slowly walking down one of the aisles, eyes scanning up and down the shelves.

"What are you supposed to do down here, anyway?"

"Oh, make sure everything's in order. Refresh some spells. Nothing exciting."

Most of the supplies looked to be food and drink, but as Lily followed Marlene down a few rows, the names on the labels became unfamiliar.

"Is the pepper in Pepper Up literal or metaphorical?" Lily asked.

Marlene finished casting a spell on a sack labeled _Flour_. "Both, really. There's capsicum in there, and the potion makes you feel better."

"Not as aptly titled as that Blood-Replenishing potion, is it?" Lily's gaze dropped to Marlene's wand. "Do you mostly attack other witches and wizards? I imagine you'd need different treatments for spell damage than Muggle battle wounds."

Marlene looked up from the jar she was inspecting. "Sorry?"

"I mean, when you raid ships, you must get spell injuries, not stabbed. That or everyone just surrenders when you show up."

But that didn't make much sense either. Lily had never heard of them before seeing the wanted poster of James, which meant they might be a newer crew. An unusually successful new crew, or one with strong financial backing. The latter seemed less plausible, though, because people with financial patrons didn't typically become pirates.

"Are you a new crew?" Lily asked. "You seem to know each other well enough, but I haven't heard much about you from other pirates."

Marlene traced the tip of her wand over the cracked jar, the glass neatly repairing itself behind it. "Yeah, that's us. Not famous at all, really."

She continued working her way down the rows, casting spells and checking things over as needed. A few rows in Lily squinted at a jar that seemed to hold animal hearts. Her hand reached out to grab it and bring it closer for inspection, but Marlene shot her a warning look.

"Why hasn't James kicked Dorcas off the crew?" Lily asked, reluctantly pulling her hand back. "She's awfully rude to most of you."

Marlene shrugged. "She knows the ship best, besides him, and she and James have worked together for a while."

"They don't seem that close."

"Maybe it's better to say they understand each other. She knows what the ship needs."

"I suppose they must be close, if James chose her as first mate."

"What? No, Remus is first mate. Dorcas is just the boatswain – she only gets to tell people what to do about the ship, and nothing more. Don't let her bother you."

"I'm not supposed to be bothered that she wants to kill me?"

"Oh, she doesn't mean it."

"It's funny," Lily said, arms folding over her chest, "because the words _kill her_ are usually very difficult to confuse for any other words."

Marlene took a few steps down the row, and Lily followed, noticing that Marlene had missed a crack in a jar labeled _Beetle eyes_.

"There's a break in the glass just there," Lily said.

Marlene stepped backwards and kneeled down to see the jar in question. With a small jet of forest green light, the crack disappeared. "Cheers," she said, and moved forward again. "I wouldn't worry about Dorcas. She just says things like that."

"What, I'm supposed to believe she's all bark and no bite?"

"Oh, no, she bites." Marlene laughed. "She bit me once in third year over a biscuit. But she also has a lot of bark. Disproportionate bark. Harmless bark. She's practically a tree."

"A tree that wants to fall over on me," Lily muttered. "Crush me with its branches."

"_Maim_ you with its branches, maybe."

"Such cruelty from you. Maybe I'll go bother Caradoc. He seems kind enough."

"Oi, I'm plenty kind. If anything, he's _too_ kind. And he's not very fun."

"Not sure there is such a thing as too kind."

Marlene turned back to Lily and rolled her eyes. "Oh, I know he hated the main character in _Amortension_. He'd never like her because she tricked that bloke into drinking Amortentia, but Caradoc would never say what he thought if he thought I didn't want to hear it."

The way they spoke about each other, and given their close ages…. They must have all gone to Hogwarts together. Then they must have all decided to become pirates together after _Before_, whatever that was…. It seemed awfully strange.

Lily didn't really _need_ to know what all this _Before _business was, not to get off the ship, but many more things would probably become clearer if she only knew what it was.

Marlene wouldn't tell her, though, which left Lily with very few options.

Two, in fact, and she already knew which one she was more interested in pursuing.

* * *

But when she tried to approach Remus after lunch, he was caught up talking to Peter, and Sirius's glare put her off hanging around to wait. Instead she wandered up the staircase to the forecastle deck, braiding her hair as she walked. While their orlop deck was pleasant enough to walk around, it still suffered from the musty, stale air that plagued all storage rooms. Besides, the clouds were in stunning form that afternoon, towering high above the sails.

She heard the door to the common room open and shut, and James's and Sirius's voices drifted up toward her. She moved further toward the front, just far enough to stay out of their view, but close enough to hear them.

"The rigging looks fine to me," Sirius said. "Dunno what Meadowes was on about."

"No, see? Right there, below the top of the sail. That knot's coming undone."

"Is it? Then you fix it, _Captain_ Potter."

"I know _I_ can do it. _You're_ the one with the knot problem."

"I do not have a _knot_ problem. That sounds ridiculous anyway. Knot problem, honestly."

"Then prove me wrong and fix it."

"I'll do it because I'm supposed to, not because I have to prove anything to you."

"I really don't care why you do it so long as you do it. Preferably before it comes undone entirely."

Lily heard Sirius muttering but couldn't make out what he was saying. Then he called out a spell, and a flash of blue light streaked up toward the sail.

"That's not _quite_ right," James said. "It's more of a—"

"Bollocks."

"I beg to differ, and as I am Captain Potter…."

"Don't pull rank on me."

"If anything I'm pulling experience. I'm perfectly entitled to pull that."

"This is how Dorcas showed me how to do it this morning before she went to bed."

"Then she showed you wrong."

"Be happy she's sleeping or you'd have bat bogeys to deal with."

"She comes to me when there are ship problems. Why don't you trust me like she does?"

Neither of them spoke for a moment, the silence a violin string pulled too tight.

"I'm only bothering you because I can," Sirius said, by way of apology.

James sighed. "I know."

"But can you get that bit—"

"Over there, yeah, I see."

"Only because of your specs."

"I'm happy enough to take away some of your eyesight. So you can share in the experience, you know. As my best mate, you should understand me perfectly, and I don't think you can until you've seen through my eyes."

"You and your _experience_. I know perfectly how much experience you've had."

"Oi, not when there's a lady on board."

"Who—_Lily_?"

"Well, all right, not a _lady_, but there is a woman on board who doesn't know us like Marlene and Dorcas."

Lily smiled to herself. Technically she was a lady, after all, but James didn't know it.

"She'll be gone soon enough," Sirius said. "I'm not worried."

"Don't tell me you're starting to come around to her."

"No, I just think Dorcas will kill her."

"You slay me with your wit."

"Not as much as Dorcas will slay her."

"You know, I really don't think that's a funny joke to be making."

"Come off it, it's nothing."

"I don't think Lily likes hearing that Dorcas is going to kill her."

Lily stood up a little straighter.

"Obviously Dorcas won't kill her," Sirius said. "Unless Lily really is a saboteur, in which case I think we all agree that would be the best course."

"If she is a saboteur, I don't think we're exactly endearing her to us, making threats like that."

"If she's a saboteur then she should be afraid for her life," Sirius said darkly.

"But, I mean, even if she is, that's not the only possible outcome."

"What other option is there? Maroon on an island?"

"No, I mean," James said, sounding a bit frustrated. "She seems clever."

"And?"

"And we need clever."

"You're not trying to get her to _join_ us, are you?"

"No, I'm—that's not at all—I don't even know she is a saboteur, all right? She could be, yeah, but—well, you know. But if we found out she _was_ a saboteur, we wouldn't have to kill her."

"We'll have to disagree on that, then."

James's tone turned harsh. "If you find evidence that she's a saboteur, you are _not_ allowed to kill her. Or let Dorcas kill her. Or anyone else."

"Oh, shove off, James."

"I mean it. You bring her to me with the evidence and I'll hear you out. But no more joking about killing her, and no _actually _killing her unless I give word."

"I thought you weren't pulling rank."

"Yeah, well," James said bitterly, "on this I am."

"You're no fun anymore."

"I'm not going to apologize for taking things seriously."

There was another tense silence from them, and Lily strained her ears, trying to hear them over the wind and the flapping sails.

Finally Sirius said, "I missed having you around."

"You're an idiot. We're finally working together, aren't we?"

"Yeah," Sirius said in a low, rough voice.

"I know you're not much of a sailor, but it's not forever."

"Not for me, anyway."

"Only 'cos you're the lucky one of us."

"Oh, I dunno about that," Sirius said. "Luck's never really been on my side."

"Except the day you met me, of course."

"Naturally. But it's all been downhill from there, honestly."

"Oh, naturally…."

Lily heard them moving, and she stepped lightly up to the very front railing, far enough away that she couldn't hear them. If they saw her, they might not suspect her of listening in on them.

At least her death seemed less imminent now. Most of the crew didn't think Dorcas would actually kill her, even if she really did want to, and the captain certainly seemed against it. Then again, they were pirates – the captain's word only went as far as the crew's trust in him.

Lily leaned her elbows on the pristine railing, the horizon lay stretching out in front of her.

She'd been lucky, up until now, not to get caught stealing. She'd been luckier yet that she'd been caught by relatively lenient pirates. But perhaps it was time for a change.

The most obvious choice was to switch to land-based thievery. If nothing else, she'd never have to suffer imprisonment again. She could escape much more easily from a jail than from a ship, should she ever get caught again.

For the first time in a long time, she briefly considered going back to England permanently, maybe finding Petunia. A comfortable life was still possible for her, after all. She wasn't too old to find a lord of a husband, and certainly not too old for children.

But she couldn't really go back to Petunia, or to that life.

They'd fought before Lily had left. Petunia had been on the verge of marriage the winter that their parents had died, and she'd told Lily without hesitation she and Vernon would take guardianship over her. The idea had sounded awful, and Lily hadn't stuck around to try it out.

Lily hadn't been sixteen for a month at that point, and she'd been in a snit since Christmas, when for the first time Severus hadn't come home from Hogwarts. His mum had refused to answer Lily's knocks and Sev hadn't sent a letter. He'd promised he'd teach her how to start a fire that Christmas, and instead Lily had received a stupid new dress for Christmas from her father and the supposedly happy news that she would go with her father to London for the season that year.

She'd been so awful to her parents in the weeks before their death, devastated over Sev's mysterious absence and resentful about the way her life was heading, and then she'd lost them in an instant.

Lily heard footsteps behind her and turned, expecting to see James.

But it was Remus who joined her at the rail. He basked in the glory of the wind for a moment before turning toward her. "Fancy another round of chess?"

Lily smiled. "Absolutely."

* * *

"What happened before?" Lily asked.

Remus sat hunched over, eyes on the board. "Before what?"

"_Before_." She moved a pawn for him to take. "Marlene and James keep talking about this thing that happened, about two years ago I think. They haven't said what it is, but it's something big that I missed, and I want to know why it's so _telling_ and _important_ that I don't know what it is."

"Ah, that." He flicked his eyes up toward her and then brought them back to the game.

But he didn't immediately elaborate, prompting Lily to ask, "So, what is it?"

"Well, the thing is, I'm not entirely sure I'm the best person to explain."

"Marlene refused, too."

He smiled fondly to himself. "That would be her approach."

"Well, would you rather I ask Dorcas instead and get my throat slit?"

"She doesn't go for the throat," he said absently.

"Oh, lovely. I'll look forward to her stabbing me in the heart, then."

He sat up straight, stretching his shoulders back, and finally looked up at Lily properly. "I'm intrigued that you ask."

"Because either I'm a saboteur or not, yes, _I know_. Except I'm not a saboteur—I don't even know what it is that I'm supposed to be sabotaging—and instead I'm just very confused."

"I suppose even if you are a saboteur, there's no harm in telling you. You would already know."

"Yes, marvelous. Now, please, clue me into this mystery that apparently shouldn't be such a mystery."

"Well," he said thoughtfully. "How to put this. I suppose the short version is that while we were at Hogwarts, there was this Dark wizard, nasty bloke, who had been gathering followers for some time. And then, one day, he got what he wanted: he and his followers took over the Ministry by force."

"That's the You Know Who I keep hearing about?"

"That's one of the names he goes by, yes."

"If he's in charge, why does he go by such a bloody stupid name?"

"He's cast a Taboo on it. If you say his name, even in your own home miles away from any of his supporters, he knows. Granted, we're nowhere near England, and it might not extend this far, but we wouldn't want to risk it."

Lily cocked her head. "You don't want What's His Face to find you."

He smiled sadly. "I see why James didn't tell you all this immediately. Suffice it to say that no, we don't want him to find us."

"You're not going to tell me why, are you," she said flatly.

"No, I'm afraid not."

"Because you still think I'm a saboteur."

"It's a possibility, isn't it? Surely you can see our reasoning."

"Not really, since I've no idea why you would think I would care what a bunch of pirates are up to off the coast of France. Or why What's His Face would, if that's who you think I'm working for."

"I suppose if you aren't a saboteur, this must be terribly confusing."

"Oh, I assure you. It is."

Remus offered her a sympathetic look.

"But all right," she said, "so someone took over the government. That happens all the time. Did a lot of people die or something?"

"It's less to do with the actual coup, which could have been worse, honestly, in terms of death toll. Although I assure you, plenty of people were killed on both sides. No, it's more…. Some people take issue with his agenda, which includes the expulsion or extinction of Muggle-born witches and wizards."

She scrunched up her nose. "What?"

"He believes they're inferior to other wizards, particularly pure-bloods, and he thinks Muggle-borns stole their magic from other witches and wizards and deserve to die."

"And this bloke's running the government?"

"To our chagrin."

Lily glanced around the room, pausing to look out the window, when suddenly Sev's warning made perfect sense. Of course she couldn't reveal her Muggle-born status to wizards, not if it might get her killed.

"This—this What's His Face," she said, leaning forward, elbows on her knees. "He wants to round up the Muggle-borns? And just—just _kill_ them? For nothing?"

"Yes."

"That's so—that's just—"

"Mad."

"Yes!"

His mouth curved into a slight smile, as if he were a professor and she'd got an answer right. "If you are a saboteur, I give you full points for a convincing portrayal."

Lily ignored him. "But really, that's what I've been missing the last two years?"

"Apparently so."

"Well, that's just…." She made a frustrated noise. A readymade rant bounced around in her head about how unfair it all was because she'd never stolen her magic from anyone, but she swallowed it. She couldn't tell any of that to Remus because she hadn't revealed that she was Muggle-born. For all she knew, they were secretly working for this Dark bloke and would hand her over whenever they returned to England.

Remus smiled at her in apology. "It's upsetting, I know."

"Upsetting is maybe a fifth of what I'm currently feeling."

"So it seems."

If she'd been told ten minutes ago that she couldn't safely return to England possibly ever, she might have been mildly upset.

But to hear that she couldn't go home because someone wanted to kill her for no good reason….

She'd never officially been a part of the wizarding world, but the idea that she couldn't join now tore at her, a restless wound in her stomach.

She'd been denied plenty of things in life already for being female, and now a group of people hated her for something else she'd had no control over, hated her enough to want to potentially _kill_ her. And she'd done _nothing_ to deserve it.

She hadn't spent much time in England during the past two and a half years—she'd been dying to get out and see the world her mother had always told her about—but now she couldn't go back. Not without fearing for her life. Even if she tried to hide her magic, as she'd always done, accidental magic happened. And, as she had learned, she could reveal herself as a witch without even realizing it.

She'd been so desperate to flee, and now that she knew she couldn't go home, images of the rolling hills along her parents' estate haunted her, a comfort now out of reach.

"You took that news very hard," Remus observed.

"Yes, well," Lily said, forcing her fists to unclench, "it's difficult to hear that there's been a governmental overthrow, as it turns out, and that the new regime is so absurdly awful."

"We couldn't believe it ourselves, at first. We were at Hogwarts, and the Headmaster told us, and we didn't—we didn't think he was joking, but it seemed impossible."

Lily nodded to herself. No wonder Sev had been worried about her that last summer. It didn't explain where he'd gone, but that had to be the reason he'd never come home.

He'd had a good reason for not coming back.

She'd been furious with him, certain he'd tired of trying to teach a Muggle-born magic, and he'd simply been hiding after a coup.

How utterly selfish and myopic of her. How foolish that she'd spent her parents' last weeks with her nose upturned because Severus had had to deal with his government being overthrown.

It was all such a waste.

"Are you quite all right?" Remus asked.

"No," she said, her voice strange and unfamiliar.

"Is there anything I can do?"

Questions about Severus, and Hogwarts, and how on earth anyone stupid enough to call himself You Know Who could possibly take over the government, and with such an asinine agenda to boot, all sprung to mind.

But really only one question mattered, in the grand scheme of things.

"Tell me someone's trying to take back the government," she said. "Tell me people aren't letting that arse stay in power."

He watched her curiously for a moment, the corners of his mouth twitching up in a resigned smile. "Where tyranny leads, resistance follows."

"Good," Lily said fiercely. "Good."

Remus and the others might have been working for What's His Face, but the way they spoke of him made it seem unlikely. Not to mention they had little cause for misleading her, as far as she knew, and Remus had already admitted to having a Muggle mother.

Of course, she only didn't trust them because of Sev, and Sev was only concerned about What's His Face finding Lily. And in turn, James's crew didn't trust Lily because of What's His Face.

Really, this whole situation was his fault.

She scowled.

Bloody What's His Face.


	5. Firing Shots

**Chapter Five – Firing Shots**

Lily showed up to James's cabin again that evening in another one of Marlene's dresses and knocked once.

James opened the door immediately, a warm smile on his face. "Welcome," he said. Algernon meowed loudly from somewhere in the room. "He says hello, too."

Lily stepped into his room and spotted Algernon stretching next to James's bed. "I might not speak cat, but I did rather guess at that one."

"Please, sit and enjoy the fruits of Caradoc's labors."

"You were very lucky to get him for your crew."

They took their seats, and Lily's mouth watered at the smell of roast potatoes. Caradoc should have been doing this work somewhere proper, like a nice household, not for pirates.

"He's an old mate," James said. "And he—well, he had his reasons."

Algernon stopped by Lily for a moment to receive a brief pat on the head, then sat down by James, his tail swishing across the wooden floor.

"Are you adapting to the ship all right?" James asked.

Lily poured the wine. "There's not much to adapt to," she said, handing him his cup. "You've a fairly typical ship, except for the magic."

"Spent a lot of time on ships, then?" He raised his wine at her in thanks.

"Oh, not usually more than a night or two at a time."

"Are you—have you spent longer than that, at all?"

"Why do you ask?"

"No reason."

Lily's eyes narrowed. "Is this an interrogation?"

"No, not—I'm just asking. I'm not much of an interrogator."

"Yes. I noticed."

He sighed. "So if you could just _tell_ me everything I want to know, that would save us both a lot of effort."

She did have to tell him _something_, or he'd never let her go.

But if it had to happen, at least it could happen on her terms.

Her mouth pulled back in a coy smile. "I've a proposal for you."

"A proposal? I love a good proposal. Don't get enough of them, really. No one proposes anything anymore."

"It's simple, really: I'll trade you answers."

He mulled over this, one hand reaching down to scratch Algernon's ears. "I can't give you much on what we're doing or where we're going."

"I know, but if I have to tell you who I am, I think it should be a fair trade."

"And why are you so curious about me? Am I that fascinating to you? That irresistible?"

"Fascinating in the way one studies an interesting species of insect, perhaps. I just want you to know how it feels."

"I suppose, in the tradition of parley, a fair trade would be acceptable."

Lily served herself some potatoes. "In that case, would you like to begin by telling me who you are? Considering last night was all about me, of course."

"You've got me there," he mused. "Well. I'm James Potter. My parents raised me in Devon. I went to Hogwarts when I was eleven—Gryffindor, of course—and stayed there until Sixth Year."

"When What's His Face took over," Lily filled in. "Remus told me."

"He mentioned as much," James said, a bit sternly.

"What, did you not want him to tell me?"

"No, it's not—" He sighed. "It's not like this is some huge secret, that You Know Who's running the Ministry. I'm just—nothing. It's fine. So now you know."

"Yes," she said bitterly. "I know."

"You don't sound pleased about what you learned."

"Of course I'm not bloody _pleased_. Remus didn't give me loads of details, but it's enough that yeah, I'm less than perfectly thrilled to hear What's His Face is in charge."

James raised his cup. "I'll drink to that."

"I should hope you'd do more than drink," she muttered, and took a large swig of wine.

His face contorted as he nearly choked on his wine. He swallowed, cleared his throat, and let out a loud, barking laugh. "I'm sorry, I must have misheard. I thought I just heard the chirping of an enormous hypocrite."

"I'm nowhere near hypocrisy. _I'm_ not the one gallivanting around, pirating and drinking and God knows what else."

"What've you been doing with your life, eh? You're not exactly the picture of nobility and chivalry."

Lily's wine sloshed around the edges of her cup as she set it down, perhaps with more force than was strictly necessary. "Chivalry? _I_ didn't know this What's His Face business was going on at all. _You_ abandoned your people when they needed you."

"Oh, and I expect that now that you know, you're going to catch the first ship back to England and go hunt him down yourself, is that it?"

"Why would I, that's not even—" She'd been planning to say _my world_, but that would reveal her Muggle-born status. She focused on her plate. "That's not fair. I'm not tied to England anymore."

"But it's your home, isn't it? The wizarding world is in a mess, yeah, but it's not like you're planning to do anything about it."

"Even if I felt the need to do something, what would I do?"

"You've got an easy out, you know." He leaned forward in his seat. "Why won't you just _admit_ you're Muggle-born? I really don't care if you are, and I don't get why you think you need to hide it. You can't be afraid because of _him_, if you've just learned about him, so are you ashamed, or what?"

Shame had nothing to do with it – Sev had explained the terminology, but never implied she was anything less than him or anyone else.

"What would you do if I were Muggle-born, anyway?" she said. "I still just learned what was going on so I still have an out."

"I wouldn't _do_ anything if you were Muggle-born. It would just explain a lot of things, and since we were supposed to be trying to get to know one another…."

He hadn't left her much choice. He could keep her as long as he wanted, since he had a wand and six crew members to back him up, and Lily had her wits, a candle, and a hairpin to her name.

He needed this to trust her. It was asinine, but that didn't make it any less true.

Besides, they didn't act like they cared if she was Muggle-born, or at least they didn't judge her for it. He cared because—because that was who she was, on some level. It did mean something, apparently. It just didn't mean everything.

"Fine," she bit out. "Yes, I am Muggle-born."

She was afraid he'd be smug in his victory, but instead his shoulders relaxed, and he sat back in his chair.

"Thank you," he said. "Now, that wasn't hard, was it?"

Lily shoved a forkful of steak into her mouth to avoid answering.

"Why were you so afraid to tell me?" he asked. "If you didn't know about What's His Face."

She swallowed and looked down at Algernon, who'd curled up in a ball at James's feet. "Someone told me it wouldn't be wise to reveal it."

"Someone like…."

"It's—complicated. My friend told me. He's the only wizard I've ever known, really, only he went to Hogwarts and I didn't."

James fixed her with a skeptical look. "He told you to hide being Muggle-born but not what's been going on?"

"He sent me a letter Before, so he must have thought it could happen, but maybe hoped it wouldn't…. He never came home that Christmas, and I don't know…."

"Oh. Right." James's expression softened. "What's your friend's name? I might know him. I might be able to—well."

James looked to be about their age, but Severus had been in Slytherin, and from the little he'd said about it, he hadn't seemed to care for Gryffindors.

She pressed her lips together. "His name's Severus Snape."

She'd expected a vaguely familiar nod, or perhaps a blank stare, but certainly not the shadow that crossed James's face.

"Snape." James looked as though he were on the verge of sicking up. "You're friends with _Severus_ _Snape_?"

"_Yes_. Or I was, until he stopped coming home. I don't even know if he's alive, all right?"

"Oh," James said darkly, "he's alive."

He was _alive._

It felt like a small elephant had moved off of her chest, and she could breathe properly again. "Do you know where he is, then?"

If he were alive, she could find him. He might be able to protect her, or maybe help her finally get a wand. And she could apologize for thinking poorly of him, even if he hadn't known she'd done so.

James's eyes narrowed. "How did you two meet?"

"We grew up in the same town." Which was technically true, even if she'd grown up on an estate and Sev had lived in the village. "He's the person who told me I was a witch."

"But you're a Muggle-born."

"And he's a half-blood," Lily said, as though it were obvious. "He never cared that I was Muggle-born."

"He's not…." James paused and gave his plate of cooling food a contemplative look. "Oh, Snape," he said, so quietly Lily nearly didn't hear him.

"Do you know where I can find him?"

"I know exactly where you can find him." He looked up at her over his glasses, head still ducked. "He's sitting at his desk at the Ministry of Magic."

"You think he—you're saying he works for What's His Face? What, as a spy or something?"

"Oh, no. He's always been evil, as far as I know. Rotten to the core, and when You Know Who came knocking, Snape and his friends all answered. Might as well have invited him in and served him tea."

She lifted her chin. "Well, obviously we can't be talking about the same person."

James let out a low laugh and ripped off a piece of bread from the loaf. "Severus Snape, a lanky sort of bloke with a big nose and disgusting hair? I'd never confuse him for anyone else. Trust me. I'm plenty familiar with him."

"He must be working there against What's His Face, then."

"Oh, Lily, you don't even know him, do you?" he said, in an awful, mocking voice. "He's Dark, that one. He knew more Dark spells as a first-year than all of Gryffindor combined. Or did he never show you those books?"

"He taught me loads of nice, useful spells."

"I wouldn't expect him to teach them to you. Harmless Muggle-born like you—he didn't want to scare you off."

Lily could feel her heart trying to leap out of her chest. Sev would never do something so monumentally stupid as to work for a man who wanted to kill her.

"Stop talking about him like that," she said sharply.

"What, like he is?"

"Severus is a good person. I've known him for years."

"I knew him for six years. Six years of watching him go deeper and deeper into the Dark."

Lily's lips pressed together, and she found she was shaking her head. "He wouldn't work for What's His Face and actually think he was in the right."

He snorted. "Well, he is. Ask any of my crew. We all knew him. I personally crossed wands with him plenty of times at Hogwarts."

James was either mistaken, or lying, but Lily couldn't figure out how he could be so completely misguided.

"Sev has _always_ been a good friend to me."

"Oh, right, of course. He's such a good friend, he completely forgot to tell you about You Know Who?"

"Because it hadn't happened yet, obviously. He sent a letter the autumn before, warning me not to tell anyone I was a Muggle-born witch, and then he never came home for Christmas, and then—then I left home."

"Right after the takeover? Care to explain that?"

She primly placed her silverware on her plate, her appetite lost. "I'm sure it's none of your business."

"And here I thought we'd be trading answers."

"Obviously I was mistaken if I thought you'd tell me the truth."

His eyebrows rose, disappearing into the locks of hair hanging over his forehead. "You think I'm lying about Snape?"

"Maybe you're lying, or maybe you don't know what you're on about."

James set down his utensils and tapped the fingers of one hand on the table. He kept watching her, and Lily avoided his gaze by looking at her plate.

Finally, he said, "You've been spending a fair amount of time with Marlene and Remus, right? You trust them more than me?"

"To an extent," she said cautiously.

"Then ask them, if you prefer to hear it from another source. Ask Marlene what happened to Mary MacDonald, or ask Remus what Snape thinks of his condition."

"Fine. Maybe I will."

"I hope you do." His cruelty hadn't returned, but an intensity she hadn't heard from him before reared up in its stead. "Because if you see Snape again, ever, I'm not sure he won't turn you right over to the authorities."

"That doesn't—why would he warn me to stay hidden and then turn me over?"

"Why wouldn't he tell you he fights for the Dark? He's not exactly a forthcoming sort of person, is he?"

She'd always had to pry Sev to get him to tell her details about Hogwarts. He only ever talked about classes, though, and the castle. Never his friends, or the enemies she hadn't even known he'd had.

"He did enough, didn't he?" she said. "I haven't told anyone but you I'm Muggle-born, and What's His Face hasn't found me."

She shot him a triumphant look, but he didn't appear to see it, lost in his own thoughts.

"You know," he said, "you need to have a backstory about your heritage ready. If you're ever going back to England, I mean. You definitely can't tell anyone there about being Muggle-born."

"I suppose I will need some cover," Lily allowed. "But I don't know when I'll be back there next. I've plenty of time to come up with something."

"Use the Potter name if you need to. I'll back you up as an illegitimate sister or something."

"Thanks?"

"And if you do go back—be careful, all right? You Know Who and his Death Eaters are ruthless."

"Death Eaters?" She snorted. "Is that really what he calls them? He's a real penchant for naming things, doesn't he."

"Finally," James said, almost smiling, "something we can agree on."

* * *

James might pretend to be mad, might pretend to be kind to her, but hearing him judge Severus, or her for trusting him…. She hadn't seen the pirate side of him before, but it was clearly there, just well masked.

He'd regret it later when she grabbed whatever he was after out of his clutches. She only needed to figure out what Peter was working on. If they were willing to forgo raids, there wasn't much left they could be chasing except something truly valuable.

If she could find out what they were after, and more importantly where it was, she could sell the information once she was free. Assuming she got off the ship sometime before they found what they were after, of course.

In the early morning hours, while most of the crew slept, Lily lit her candle and snuck up to the main deck, where thick, dark clouds hung suspended overhead, threatening a storm. Dorcas worked on the far side of the main deck, ropes flying around her in a whirlwind. Marlene stood on watch in the crow's nest, hopefully without a book in hand, and the lone candle in the common room had to belong to Sirius.

Lily crept across the deck and slipped through the library door when Dorcas's back was turned, and began rifling through the papers along the shelves. She found personal letters, maps of the French coast, and lists of people she didn't know – nothing that struck her as terribly significant.

Thankfully most of the shelves held books, and while it was possible Peter was hiding his project in one of them, she'd have to come back later and search them strategically. For now she focused on the papers. If Peter was accessing his project every day, multiple times a day, he'd keep it in a convenient but secure location.

Her eyes slid over to the corner of the room, along the wall to James's cabin, to an ornate wooden cabinet.

Lily quietly strode over, pulling her hairpin out as she walked, and slid it into the empty keyhole. She examined the latch when she opened it and smiled – as best she could tell, it would lock upon closing.

Inside the cabinet she found more stacks of parchment, some folded, others rolled up and bound with twine. She flipped through several documents, all meaningless handwritten scribbles to her, before reaching for a loosely rolled parchment on a lower shelf.

She turned around to spread the parchment out on the table in the center of the room.

The map identified a few small islands in the typical fashion, but someone had drawn shapes all over the map and written short strings of Latin at random intervals.

Most curious of all, if it were being used as a proper navigational map, it should have been in the navigation room. But instead it was in the library, in Peter's workspace.

She sank into a chair and looked at the handwritten parchments she'd found underneath the map, her eyes flying over the pages. Someone had copied the words and phrases from the map onto the parchment and started translating them into English.

Some of the words resembled spells—single Latin words, like _evanescere_—while other, longer strings of words seemed like the ramblings of a lunatic. Peter had interpreted the longest string as _sad wind follows a stormy sea._

Lily glanced back and forth between the notes and the map, wondering why the hell Peter would be puzzling over such a strange map, when a slow, heady pleasure washed through her.

There was only one reason pirates would pore over barmy maps. After all, there was only one thing pirates really wanted, in the end.

Treasure.

Particularly the sort of treasure that someone might want to conceal. Particularly the sort of concealed treasure that was buried on an island.

Lily had never seen a real treasure map before. Then again, she'd never spent more than a few months on one ship, and that was just the once.

She started to read over Peter's notes, absorbing bits of the map's language and immediately trying to translate them.

Peter had only translated the Latin—and not particularly well, from what she could tell—and tried rearranging the Latin words into anagrams. He hadn't worked on the shapes at all.

He also hadn't written anything about the lone English phrase at the bottom of the map, which read, _Where he lay fettered_.

Curious. Very curious.

By itself, the knowledge of the map would be useless. She'd either have to steal the map—difficult—or solve it before Peter did—much more feasible, based on his existing work. If she could find the treasure first, or sell the information on how to get there for a high enough price, she could….well, she'd have options. Better options than she had now.

Lily looked back at the map in earnest. Interestingly, the mapmaker had added shapes made out of smaller shapes: a ring of small squares dominated the western part of the map, a cross of stars stood over the middle, and a triangle of circles dotted the east.

It was almost a pattern, but not quite.

The cross of stars was the odd one out. It should have been a square made of small triangles, if the mapmaker had followed the pattern of the other two. Instead he'd made a starred cross.

She smiled to herself. Her mother had read her _Romeo and Juliet_ when she was twelve, curled up on the sofa in the library, sunlight dazzling through the windows. As best Lily could tell, Peter seemed to be star-crossed with the meaning of the map.

It wasn't clear that the break in the pattern was important, but it was a start.

* * *

Lily hadn't known how to ask Marlene and Remus about Severus, but it turned out she needn't have worried. Despite everyone working disjointed schedules, word traveled quickly on board, and she'd barely sat down after breakfast when the crew came to her.

Sirius rested his arms on the back of the sofa where Lily was reading, rain-drenched windows blurring the sea in front of them.

"I find it very suspicious that you're acquainted with Snivellus."

Lily kept looking at her book. "I find it very atrocious that you'd call anyone a name like that, given your age."

"He and I go back, you know."

"No, I don't, and I don't actually care."

He grabbed the book out of Lily's hands, one of the pages slicing along her palm in the process. She swore under her breath at the sting and climbed to her feet, glaring at him.

"If you really are Muggle-born," he said, making it perfectly clear he thought anything but, "you wouldn't know, but I'm a Black by birth, and the Black family's nothing but Dark, rotten people."

"So you fit right in, then."

"The adults who raised me nearly pissed themselves with glee the moment they found out You Know Who had won."

"That's lovely to hear. I like you so much better now."

Sirius came around the sofa to loom over her. "I want you to understand that I _know_ what Dark wizards are like. I'm plenty familiar with their ilk, and I know what I'm talking about when I tell you that Severus Snape is as Dark as they come."

"Oh, _yes_, that's why he cursed me all those times for being Muggle-born. Thanks for clearing that up."

He sneered. "He probably wanted to shag you."

Lily's hand reached out and slapped his face before she even knew she was going to do it, her cut leaving a thin, bloody streak on his cheek, bright against his fair skin.

"Don't you _dare_ disrespect my friend that way," she said, her voice low.

They both froze for a moment, staring at each other. Another sheet of rain thundered against the windows, and Lily's mind had gone blank, still processing what had just happened.

And then the moment broke, both of them looking away at the same time.

Lily rubbed her sore palm with her other hand while Sirius absently reached one hand up to touch his cheek. He inspected his hand, his lip curling when he saw the blood staining his fingers.

He shot her a warning look, a cruel glint in his eye, and a bolt of fear shot through Lily. He had a wand, and she didn't, and by his own admission he probably knew more Dark spells than anyone else on board.

"No wonder Severus hated you," she said. "You're just as rotten as your family."

"No wonder you were friends with Severus. You're clearly on the same side as him."

She nearly told him to get out, but she had no right, and that burned. She had nowhere to run, nowhere safe to go. She was stuck on a ship with people who had joked about killing her, who had no respect for her friend, and who seemed to be following a map written by a madman.

"All of you think you're so clever," she said, "thinking you've caught me in the middle of some grand scheme. You think you can treat me like dirt because there's a slim chance I'm here to—well, I don't know, exactly, throw you off course? What am I supposed to be doing that's so bloody threatening? You've got no evidence to go on and you're being a complete arse just because you can!"

"Oi, what's going on here?" Marlene strode into the room and over toward them. Her hair had gone dark with rainwater, her shirt clinging to her body. She looked between them and saw the blood on Sirius's face. "Get up to the crow's nest, Black. Right now."

"You're not in charge, McKinnon."

"No, but James sent me to come remind you where you're supposed to be, and I find you hiding in the common room. What, afraid of a little thunderstorm?"

"Fuck off."

"I will once you get to work."

He made a low, threatening noise in his throat, and then spun around and stalked out of the room.

Marlene sighed and began wringing out her hair. "What happened?"

"He had some very unkind things to say about a mutual acquaintance."

"Oh, Snape? What a tosser."

"Sirius or Severus?"

"Both." Marlene reached out a wet hand to grab Lily's wrist. "Hold on, I can fix that."

She pulled out her wand and murmured a spell, tracing her wand along the cut. Lily's skin knit together perfectly behind the spell, without even so much as a scar.

Lily gave a rueful smile and dropped back onto the sofa. "Thanks."

"Did he do that to you?" Marlene sat down next to Lily, apparently unconcerned that the cushion beneath her began absorbing the water still dripping off of her. "Because James won't stand for that."

Lily shook her head. Her heart had started slowing down to a normal pace, but her body still prickled with leftover adrenaline. "He was just being a twat. He didn't mean to cut me."

"Not really fair, fighting an unarmed witch, is it?"

"I would think not."

Marlene grinned. "But it looked like you smacked him. That doesn't happen accidentally."

"Would that someone would loan me a wand so I could castrate him. Or give me a knife. Either way, I could do it."

"Mm, I know the feeling."

Thunder grumbled outside, just enough to remind the world it was there, but not with any particular malice.

Lily leaned back against a throw pillow. "Please tell me you're not here to warn me about Severus, too."

Marlene shrugged and pushed a wet lock of hair out of her face. "I don't know what the point would be. I never liked him, but James and Sirius have always hated him the most of anyone."

"Oh, the Fates would trap me on a ship with Sev's enemies, wouldn't they?"

"Fate didn't do anything. You brought yourself here."

"Doesn't mean I can't blame someone else, does it?"

"No. But I don't think the courts would buy 'The Fates made me castrate him' as an excuse."

"I suppose not," Lily sighed. "But from the sound of it, your courts aren't anything like fair."

"No," Marlene said sadly, "not anymore."

* * *

The rain didn't let up for the rest of the morning. Lily tried to get back into her book of plays, but her mind kept wandering, and eventually she set aside Aristophanes entirely.

The problem was, it wasn't _entirely_ shocking that the crew said those things about Severus. He was difficult, and sad, and sometimes the way he spoke about other people…he did think he was better than them, in a way. He made disparaging comments sometimes about the idiots and fools in his classes, and expected Lily to laugh along with him.

Although that had bothered her sometimes, and although she'd never laughed at those things, he'd never treated Lily with anything less than the utmost respect. Sometimes he'd taunted Petunia, yes, but that was _Petunia_, and he'd never seriously hurt her.

He had the potential for malice, but to hear that he had joined up with What's His Face, with people who wanted to _kill_ Lily…it seemed unfathomable. But if Sev had been offered a position of power, he would have taken it without question.

She wrapped her arms around her knees, feeling gutted, and more alone than she had in months.

She'd never know if he had stayed away out of concern for her safety, or if he simply couldn't face her when he was technically supposed to turn her over to the authorities.

It felt like losing him all over again.

Only this time it was worse because she wasn't just speculating about his absence. She knew perfectly well where he was, but if she approached him now, she wouldn't be able to trust him. She wouldn't know for certain that he hadn't changed his ways, that he wouldn't turn on her in a second.

She squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her face into her knees.

"Lily?"

She whipped her head back to look at the door, elbow running into the back of the sofa. But it was just James and his cat, both soaked to the bone.

"Yeah," she said.

"Ugh, I can't even see you." He wiped his glasses off on his shirt, replaced them, and slanted a small smile at her. "There we go."

She made a show of looking him up and down. "You're only concerned about your glasses?"

Algernon shook himself, the water from his fur splashing onto James's already drenched trousers, and James sighed. He drew his wand in a line from his shoulders down, steam trailing behind it as his clothes dried, and then used his sleeve to dry off his face.

"You're still dripping," she said as he approached her.

He'd done nothing to his hair, still plastered to the sides of his head and dripping water onto his shoulders.

"My hair is immune to most spells." He sat down on the other end of the sofa. "I'd have worn my hat if it wouldn't have filled up with water."

Algernon had followed him and looked ready to leap into his lap.

"Oi," James told him, "none of that. Either you suffer being wet, or you let me dry you off, and I'm not drying you off because I remember what happened last time, so there's really no choice at all."

Algernon growled and shuddered once more, sending a few more drops of water at James.

"Moody little thing," James said to Lily.

Algernon headbutted James's shin, and Lily found herself letting out a soft laugh.

"Still working on the mad pirate thing?" she asked.

"It's a work in progress."

Lily watched Algernon curl up in a ball on the floor, looking like a mouse he'd eaten had gone off.

"So I hear you and Sirius had a lovely encounter earlier this morning," James said.

"Oh, yes, very memorable."

"Do I need to intervene?"

Even though James had tried to get everyone to stop joking about killing her, this—this was something different. This was an active offer of protection from the people he trusted.

A strange ache blossomed in her chest, but she ignored it in favor of answering James.

"I can take care of myself."

"I didn't—I didn't tell him you knew Snape. He overheard me—well. He overheard me, and given we've got so little exciting news around here…."

"Everyone knows."

"Yeah. So, sorry. I didn't—"

"You didn't send me to talk to Sirius about Snape for a reason."

"They've—it's complicated." His hand automatically went up to his hair, and he frowned when he seemed to remember it was still wet. His hand dropped back down into his lap. "I don't think I can tell you much about them, but yeah. Neither of us is the most objective person to talk to about Snape."

"I gathered."

"So, yeah. I dunno what Marlene told you. She's not….yeah."

Lily nodded. "She seemed a little more balanced about it."

"Well, that's true about most things." He smiled. "So, anyway. Marlene said you're all right, and Sirius is moping up in the crow's nest, but I don't—I don't want either of you to hurt each other anymore, all right?"

"I've no objection to this plan."

James let out a strained breath. "He's just—Snape is such a sore topic, and with You Know Who, and Sirius and I—he's not at his best today."

She could have made just as many rationalizations for Severus, but arguing would get her nowhere.

"I'll talk to Remus later," she said.

"That's good. He'll…he's certainly got a different perspective than Sirius."

"Don't tell me they were friends."

"Oh, Merlin no. But—well, I'll let Remus do the explaining. He'll do it best, and it's only right, really…." He trailed off, one hand rubbing the back of his neck.

"I'll talk to him after lunch."

"Good. Good. Well." He stood up, looking down at his cat, but Algernon growled and curled up tighter. James shook his head, a small smile on his face, and glanced back at Lily. "I'll leave you to your book."

Lily nearly asked him to stay—if her shift tracking was correct, he wasn't on duty at the moment—but she couldn't seem to get the words to come out.

"All right," she said instead.

"And let me know if anyone jokes about killing you because that's—that's just off limits now, as far as I'm concerned."

"Thanks. I do…I appreciate that."

"Right. Then. Later."

* * *

**Author's Note: **The fabulous Zeina made a terrific graphic of the map Lily found – I've put a link to it on my FFN profile. If you are so inclined, you can take a stab at solving the map along with Lily. Almost all the clues you'll get are already on the map, and all you need to solve it is logic and some baseline cultural knowledge. I really don't know how hard it is to figure out since I created it, but thought I'd offer up the challenge in case anyone is interested in giving it a shot.


	6. Off Limits

**Chapter Six – Off Limits**

Lily moved a pawn. "Tell me about Severus Snape."

Remus watched her pawn for a long moment. The rain outside had let up after lunch, reduced now to a pitiful, miserable drizzle.

"I admit," he said, "I'm curious to learn how you know him."

"We grew up together, and I never knew him as anything other than a good bloke. Harsh, sometimes, but good. James told me—well, that he's working for the Ministry, and that he's Dark, and I didn't believe him, and he said to talk to you."

Although Remus looked distracted while he slid a pawn forward, it wasn't a bad move. "I think you knew a very different person than we did. The Snape we know from Hogwarts is, well, broken, a little. You're likely more familiar with his life circumstances than I, but he's always struck me as someone desperate for love and approval."

Sirius had been chomping at the bit to talk about Severus, and Marlene had discussed him with less than full enthusiasm, but Remus spoke reluctantly, and accurately.

Sev's parents had never been anything like kind to him, and sometimes Lily hid him in a spare servant's room overnight when it seemed unsafe for him to return to the village. In retrospect the household staff had to have told her parents about the surprise guest, but if her parents had known, they hadn't stopped it.

She toyed with a rook before shifting it, intending to sacrifice it in a few rounds. "James said I should ask you about Severus and your 'condition,' whatever that is."

Remus's eyes flicked upwards while he seemed to ponder something, but he brought them back down after a moment and smiled in the slightly sad way she'd seen him wear more than once. "I suppose it will be relevant to you soon enough." He began rolling up his sleeves.

Lily tried not to stare at his scars. "He didn't make it sound like you were dying, so I'm not sure…."

"Well, we're all dying, aren't we? I'm likely dying more quickly than most, but no, not so immediately. Normally I wouldn't divulge this information, particularly not to those I've only just met, but even if you are a saboteur I wouldn't curse you with this."

"Which is?"

"I'm a werewolf," he said apologetically, baring the long scars marring his arms. "The full moon is only two days away. Even if James agreed to release you today, I don't believe we'd make it to land in time to get you off board before then."

Lily's heart began to beat in an odd rhythm. "We're going to be on board with you while you're a wolf, but from what I've heard, if you bite one of us…."

"No, no," he assured her. "I'll be locked in the magazine all night, safe below deck and safe from harming anyone else."

"Oh, thank God. Sorry, not that I'm—I don't think you're awful, but I didn't—"

"I apologize, I didn't phrase that as well as I should have. It's difficult to remember how little you know about the ship."

"I only know so little," she pointed out, "because no one will tell me anything."

"Truly, it's for your own safety."

"But how can I _know_ that until you tell me more information?"

"I suppose you'll just have to trust us."

Frustration twisted at her stomach. She'd trusted them plenty – she'd told them what she wanted, that she was Muggle-born, that she didn't need James to babysit her from Sirius. But they didn't seem to notice any of it.

Instead, she shoved another pawn toward Remus's side of the board. "What does Severus have to do with your condition?"

"Oh, he rather despises me for it."

"He would—why would he despise you for it?"

"He believes I'm a monster, I suppose," Remus said thoughtfully. "I don't know that he ever used that specific term, granted, but I think that's the most concise way to explain the things he's said to me since he learned of my condition."

"But…. You didn't choose to become a werewolf, did you?"

"No," he said with a rueful smile. "I rather didn't."

Lily's lips pressed together as she watched Remus send out a knight. She could best the move well enough—she thought she understood which strategy he was using—but there seemed to be very little to say about Severus. Despite what she knew of him, everyone else was making him out to be some sort of evil villain.

Everyone, that was, but Remus.

"I'm certain that Severus has been a dear friend to you, in his own way. And if you know him, I don't think you'll disagree that empathy is not one of his strengths."

Lily leaned back in her chair, arms folded. She couldn't agree with him, not outright—that brushed too close to betrayal—and she cursed James for sending her to Remus. Remus, who saw others clearly, and kindly, and had nothing but compassion to offer, even to those who apparently despised him. Remus, who seemed much too humane to succeed in his chosen profession.

She took one of his pawns. "How did you end up a pirate?"

He blinked, a little taken aback. "James asked me to join his crew."

"And that's it. That's all it took for you to join up?"

"I'm sure if you stay on board long enough, you'll understand." He smiled. "When James asks, you go."

* * *

Algernon trotted into the common room, the door swinging open for him, and stopped next to Lily where she sat curled up on the sofa. Normally he'd plunk down on the ground and demand to be petted, but this time he stayed standing, and looked up at her expectantly with his one visible eye.

"I'm no cat whisperer." She dog-earred her place in her book. "I don't know what you want."

But Algernon kept looking at her.

"You'll have to be more explicit."

He waved his tail in the air twice, and then slowly walked back to the door, which opened again. Then he turned his head back to look at Lily.

"Hang on a minute." Her eyes narrowed. "It's almost dinner time, isn't it?"

Algernon meowed, sounding rather annoyed.

"Is this James trying to get me to join him for an early dinner?"

He finally looked away from her and walked out the door, head held high.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," she muttered.

But she followed him out the door and across the deck all the same. By now the rain clouds had moved on, the ship glimmering in the rays of sun straining through thin clouds, light catching on the raindrops still clinging to the deck and rails.

Sirius stood at the helm looking perfectly bored and elegant, hair blowing in the wind and making him look more attractive than he had any right to with his personality. As Lily approached the door to the library beneath him, she could see a hint of a scowl on his face.

She made a low noise of discontentment, and Algernon looked back at her, curious.

"It's nothing," she said, and then realized she was talking to a cat again.

The library door opened for Algernon, and Lily had to admire the spellwork that had gone into the system. If they were in fact a newer crew, they'd probably inherited the ship from someone else – the level of detail in the ship design couldn't have come from anyone who didn't intimately understand sailing.

She followed him through the library and into the captain's cabin, where dinner awaited her.

James turned from the window to beam at them. "It worked!"

She sent him a mock-glare and folded her arms while Algernon strolled over to James. "You sent your cat to fetch me."

"Brilliant, right?"

"A girl might take offense," she said loftily, "that you didn't come in person."

"Hey, you should be honored." He bent down to scratch Algernon's ears. "I've never managed to get him to fetch a person before."

"He fetches things other than people?"

"Oh, he'll fetch food, or papers. Loads of things." He stood up properly and stretched his shoulders back. "If he's in the mood, anyway. And it doesn't work too well on the ship since the galley's down a level."

A short, content noise rumbled out of Algernon's chest.

"I think your madness must be catching," Lily said, "because I actually believe you."

"Finally, someone does."

"You don't get a lot of that, do you?"

"Sadly, no. It's a travesty. A massive miscarriage of justice."

"Now that I don't believe."

He grinned winningly at her, and extended an arm toward the table. "I believe you know the way."

Like a gentleman, he waited for her to sit down first. She reached for the wine and served herself before he could. To her surprise, Algernon circled around twice next to her chair, and then settled in, looking ready for a good nap.

James leaned a little sideways in his seat, his elbow on the table – not that much of a gentleman, apparently. "We got distracted yesterday."

She poured him a cup of wine. "Did we?"

"We were going to trade answers," he reminded her, taking his cup back when she offered it.

"I did make that offer, didn't I?"

"Is it still available?"

"I could be persuaded," she said, ladling out some stew for both of them, "although after the way you went off about my friend after my first answer…."

"I won't bring him up again," James said firmly.

"Thank you."

"How did this turn into me trying to persuade you to give me answers? _You_ should be trying to win _me_ over."

She looked up at him through her lashes. "I thought I already had."

His mouth pulled back in a grin. "In one way, I'll concede, but not others."

"Very well, if you _insist_ that I try to win you over."

"And I do."

"Then yes, my offer is still available."

"Excellent." He picked up his spoon. "Terms?"

"To be determined as necessary."

"Making things up as you go along?"

"That's what I do for a living, isn't it?" She stirred her stew to release some of the heat. "I believe you owe me an answer or two, Captain Potter. Last night I told you I was Muggle-born, and that I knew Severus."

"Ah, but asking about Snape was only a follow-up question to the original question. It wasn't a new line of inquiry."

"It was still a question, and I still provided two answers."

"Then, please, how may I repay the debt?"

Lily didn't actually want to know most of the things she could ask, but it did seem more palatable to surrender information about her life if he was forced to do the same.

"What was Hogwarts like?" she asked.

"That's your big opening question? That's what you're dying to know?"

"Yes."

"If that's how you want to use your questions. But Hogwarts," James mused. "Well, it's only the most marvelous place on earth. It's a proper castle next to a lake in the mountains, you know? The staircases move and the food is amazing and…and it was home."

"Is it still open? Or did What's His Face…."

"The funny thing is, he loves Hogwarts. It's actually impossible not to. The school is still technically open and running, but…."

"But you stopped attending."

He nodded. "My friends couldn't go anymore, not with who they are, and I didn't want to. Not the way it is now. It's—it's not Hogwarts, anymore. It's in the castle, but it's not Hogwarts. Not really."

She lifted her cup to her lips. "Am I to believe, then, that you dropped out of school and became a pirate, of all things?"

"But I've just given you two answers – it's my turn now, isn't it?"

"The second question wasn't a proper question. It was…a factual inquiry."

"So was your blood status," James pointed out.

"Touché." Lily fixed him with a smile. "That's my next question after yours, then."

"All right." His eyes darted up and down, assessing. "Have you ever had a wand?"

She looked down and stirred her stew. "No."

"But you're a witch, and you know you're a witch. Why didn't you go get one?"

"Are we doing one question each or two?"

"Let's say we allow one follow-up, or we'll never get anywhere."

"I suppose I could consent to those terms."

She fished a piece of beef out of her stew with her spoon, picked it up with two fingers, and bent down to offer it to Algernon. Algernon's rough tongue lapped at her fingers, and he made a pleased noise, his tail swishing along the floor.

"And?" James prompted.

She smiled without humor. "I never got a wand because I never knew where to buy one."

"I never—I didn't think about that."

"I can't imagine why you would."

He chewed for a few moments, apparently pondering her answer by the intense look in his eyes. Finally he swallowed. "But your hairpin is magical."

She'd encountered a handful of witches and wizards in her time, people with objects or vocabularies that tipped her off. They'd been happy enough to barter. But she'd only found them on ships or in small port towns, far away from wand shops.

"If that's a question," she said, "you'll have to wait. It's my turn, remember, and I still want to know why you became a pirate."

He shrugged and looked down at his bowl. "Well, you'll be disappointed. That topic is off-limits."

"You can't just say it's off-limits."

"You made Snape off-limits."

"You agreed not to bring him up."

"And I'm asking you to agree not to bring up this topic. So unless you'd like to make Snape within bounds…."

She wouldn't divulge information about Severus, even if he really was working for What's His Face. She wouldn't give up his secrets to someone who spoke so poorly of him.

"Fine," she conceded. "Severus is off-limits."

"Then so is my piracy."

"I'd like to point out that that's a much broader topic to bar, compared to one person I haven't seen in three years."

"But we care equally about hiding them, which means they're effectively equivalent for the purposes of this discussion."

Lily bit back a grin. She shouldn't be smiling, not when he kept using her own rule of making up the rules against her, but she so rarely met a good conversationalist among pirates. Besides, he wasn't wrong, and she knew it, and he knew she knew.

"Can I ask how you got your ship?" she asked. "You're awfully young to be a captain."

"I'd argue piracy and my ship are irrevocably intertwined."

"I'd argue you could have a ship and be a merchant or something. Unless a ship fell into your hands and inspired you to become a pirate."

He tapped his fingers on the table. "I suppose it's not _technically_ related to my piracy to say I inherited the ship from my parents."

Apparently Lily wasn't the only one in the family business. Although it seemed strange that pirates would send their child to a boarding school in Scotland.

"Were your parents pirates?" She added, before he could object, "That's not related to _your_ piracy, mind you. It's related to theirs."

His lips twitched in amusement. "No, they weren't. And now it's my turn—the hairpin. How did you get it?"

"I traded for it."

"But somewhere you couldn't get a wand…."

"Is that your follow-up question?"

"No, just speculating. I suppose it doesn't matter where you got it." He twirled his spoon in his hand. "All right, if you want to bring up Hogwarts, I have to ask. Why didn't you go?"

"Simple enough. My parents wouldn't let me."

"Care to elaborate?"

"No, I don't think I do," she said, smirking. "You'll have to use another question for that, but it's my turn."

He nodded in concession and sipped his wine.

"Why did you leave England?" she asked.

James took his time answering, sitting up and rubbing the back of his neck. Finally, he said, "That's related to my piracy, and therefore I won't answer it."

"That's not fair. You could just say anything is related to your piracy to avoid answering, and I'd have no idea."

"You don't trust me to play fair? I'm wounded."

"Pirate," Lily reminded him.

"Mm," he said, distracted. "I'll only say that I left because it was the right thing to do, and because I'd been waiting for the opportunity."

"Half an answer means I get another question."

"I certainly wasn't informed about that possibility."

"I'm the one with the information you want."

"Therefore you make the rules?"

"Precisely."

"And you're certain you're not a pirate?"

"Only by birth." She nearly said 'only half,' but he'd already made that joke.

James's eyebrows shot up. "Oh?"

Lily bit back a curse. That was something about herself she could tell other pirates, but not him. It wasn't that she was concerned he'd judge her for it—after all, he claimed the same title—but she couldn't give away things like that, not without making him work for it.

"The game's over," she announced, resting her spoon against the side of her bowl.

He flashed a smile at her. "What if I'm not ready to be done?"

"As I said, I make the rules as we go along, and I say we're done."

"It's true, I can't force you to play."

"We can play again some other time," she told him. Now there were rules, and she could think out how to frame some of the things she didn't really want to reveal to him.

"But who says I'll want to play again?"

"I can't imagine why you wouldn't."

"You keep changing the rules and then you cut off the game off when you feel like it. Tell me, where's my incentive to play?"

"I'm a drain on your resources and some of your crew don't like me. Surely you've as much interest as I do in parting ways."

He shrugged. "Not particularly."

"But if we don't play, how am I supposed to…." Lily didn't need to finish, and sighed instead.

"If we don't play," James supplied, "I have to keep enduring your fascinating company."

It had been entertaining to play at the idea that she had some control over her situation, but the fact that he still held all the cards came crashing back down on her.

He wasn't a friend. They might pretend they were, and she did enjoy being around him, but that interpretation of their relationship was facile. He was someone she had to get to trust her just enough to let her go, and then they'd never see each other again.

That was all.

* * *

Lily awoke slowly to the sounds of someone rustling in their trunk, and she raised her head just in time to see Peter climbing up to the main deck.

If she was going to get off this bloody ship, she'd probably need a majority vote of the crew members. Remus, Marlene, and Caradoc might all vote that she could leave. James and Dorcas had made their feelings clear, and she'd only gone backwards with Sirius.

But Peter.

Peter didn't seem to care for her, but he also didn't seem to loathe her very existence.

In fact, he was the most mysterious person on the ship. He didn't spend much time at meals, but she'd seen him talking to the others in the common room in the evenings. And apart from his watch shift, he didn't serve any of the usual functions of a crew member. From all appearances, they'd assigned him only to work on understanding the treasure map.

She'd rummaged through his notes again the night before, and although he hadn't made much progress since she'd last looked, she had found a new sheet of parchment that outlined the details the map hid:

_Need: _

_Starting point_

_Direction_

_Distance?_

Next to _Starting point_, Peter had written, _Azores Islands. _Someone else had written by that, _You're the master of the obvious_, and Peter had written underneath that, _It's more than nothing_.

Elsewhere Peter and the same person had written another exchange.

_Where did he lay fettered? Who is __he__?_

_You Know Who._

And below that, a third person had written, _Very funny._

_It's the closest thing we have to a location_, Peter had written._ Could be a reference to the starting point._

Of course, it wasn't entirely Peter's fault that he was struggling. The map made no sense. Lily had stared blankly at the map for twenty minutes before abandoning hope of reaching any sudden insight.

She might not have been able to pick Peter's brain about the map, but she could still try to convince him she wasn't a saboteur.

Nearly everyone was seated by the time she entered the common room. Dorcas's naturally displeased face went a shade grimmer, and she and Sirius shared a brief glance of annoyance without pausing in their conversation.

Caradoc lowered the plates onto the table just as Lily slid into the seat between Peter and Marlene.

"D'you want a new dress for tonight?" Marlene asked.

Lily grabbed a piece of toast and shook her head. "No, but thanks."

Dorcas snorted across the table, but Lily held her head high and ignored her.

"He's coming around to me, I think," she said to Marlene, mostly to annoy Sirius. "We had a very nice discussion last night."

She didn't miss the dark flash in his eyes as he shoved porridge into his mouth.

After swallowing, he said, "McKinnon the elder says hello to everyone."

Marlene's head snapped up, face bright and eager. "Did James talk to him?"

"Not to him personally," Sirius said, with all the smugness of someone withholding important information. "But he sends his regards."

"Is Eli doing well?" Caradoc asked. "And Catherine?"

"They seem to be, yeah," Sirius said, one shoulder pulled back over the chair, his arm dangling behind him. "Catherine's pregnant." He wore a cocky grin with an air of not really caring either way, but his smile reached his eyes too much for Lily to believe his act.

"I'm going to be an aunt!" Marlene slapped a hand on the table. "Any idea on names? I mean, besides Marlene, obviously."

Sirius took a long swig of juice. "Dunno."

Lily watched Marlene have a small fit in her chair, and glanced sideways to Peter. They shared a brief smile before Peter went back to pouring himself more tea.

"Congratulations to your brother," Lily said.

Sirius rolled his eyes, but Marlene didn't seem bothered at all.

"He was supposed to join the crew," Marlene told Lily. "He taught me everything I know about Healing. And I suppose he'll teach little Marlene that, too."

"You're definitely not being premature," Sirius said. "Not one bit."

"Sod off, Black," Marlene said cheerfully. "You can't bring me down to your level. Not today."

"Your brother wasn't interested in being a pirate?" Lily asked.

"He got married instead, the prat. They were going to wait, but with—well, everything, waiting seemed like a bad idea."

Lily nodded. "Understandable."

"Yeah," Marlene said, at the same time Sirius said, "And we got stuck with her instead."

Dorcas's elbow jerked sideways into Sirius's ribs.

"Oi." He rubbed at where she'd jabbed him. "I'm just saying I'd prefer to have Eli around."

"Unacceptable," Dorcas said.

Marlene smirked at Sirius, and he hunched over his plate.

"Two days in a row of women attacking me," he grumbled.

Peter set down his glass. "Who else attacked you?"

Sirius angled his head up to glare at Lily, and Peter gave a short nod.

"And you didn't even kill her," Dorcas said, in an impressed sort of way.

Sirius threw a dirty look at Marlene. "McKinnon saved her."

"Hufflepuff," Dorcas muttered.

Marlene made a noise of protest.

"I take back my jab," Dorcas told Sirius, and he lazily saluted her.

"How do you suppose your parents are taking the news?" Caradoc asked Marlene loudly. Or at least, loudly for Caradoc, which was enough to shut everyone else up.

"Oh, they'll be _thrilled_," Marlene said. "They've been after me, even…."

Lily had never been one to lose her head around the idea of children, and she turned to Peter, who looked equally bored by the turn in conversation.

"So," she said, "what's the best raid you lot have made, then?"

"Er," said Peter. "Let me think about that." He didn't look at Lily—he didn't seem to like facing her full on—but at least he didn't outright ignore her.

She smiled, trying to put him at ease. "That many good ones?"

He gave her a quick, half-hearted smile. "Yeah, they're just—they kind of run together."

"Your crew certainly seems successful enough."

Peter nodded. "James is great. He's a brilliant captain."

"Have you mostly stuck to Europe? I hear the Caribbean's lovely, although I haven't got over that way yet."

"No, we've never left Europe." HE scooped the last of his egg into his mouth.

"Oh, I went down to northern Africa once. Hot as hell. I left as soon as possible."

"Yeah, I bet." He shoved back in his seat, the chair scraping loudly against the floor. "I'm off to the library, then."

He practically ran out of the room without another look at Lily, and she resisted the urge to sigh.

Sirius shot her a triumphant look when the door had swung shut again. "Sorry, love. It's a pirate thing. See, with magical pirates, it's not exactly custom to discuss your previous adventures."

"Why's that?" Lily asked. In her experience, bragging rights were half the reason pirates did anything.

"You'd have to ask the pirates that preceded us," he said, as though it were obvious.

Dorcas snorted into her tea.

Lily looked to Marlene, whose face had closed off. There had to have been some reference Lily was missing out on, like a dead former crew mate, or something.

Dorcas whispered something into Sirius's ear, and Lily leaned into Marlene. "Custom aside," she said quietly, "I don't understand why Peter's so…."

Marlene's eyes flicked to Sirius, who was laughing, head thrown back. "He's just…he's a nice enough bloke, really. We haven't talked _too_ much. He's always tagged along after the others – he can be a little quiet around them."

"I see that." Lily's eyes flicked to Sirius.

She tried the library door after breakfast, but it remained locked. She sighed and turned around to see Marlene casting spells at the ropes connected to the sails. It looked complicated—ropes flew in every direction—and Lily didn't want to disrupt her concentration.

For company, that left her with James or Caradoc, and James seemed to have disappeared into his cabin after covering watch during breakfast.

Peter would have been the most useful option, but it would be good to talk to Caradoc, too. Although he seemed to like her well enough, it couldn't help to be sure. Besides, he could answer some questions no one else on board could.

She climbed down onto the gun deck and turned away from the beds, toward a wall with a plain wooden door that she'd assumed led to the galley.

She knocked because it seemed like the polite thing to do, and entered when Caradoc called for her to do so.

The air in the galley was a drastic change from the gundeck, heavy with water and heat, and the walls held sunny, round windows Lily was positive didn't exist from the outside.

They'd enlarged the kitchen like they had the orlop deck – it stretched further than logic dictated, with long counters, copper pots and pans hanging overhead, and what looked like a pantry door tucked in a corner. Their breakfast dishes sat stacked up neatly next to a nearly overflowing sink. One by one, the plates dunked themselves into the water, and a dishbrush attacked the food remains with vigor.

"And here I pictured you sitting in a dark, manky cupboard peeling vegetables by hand," she said.

Caradoc sat on a wooden stool next to a bucket, his wand pointed at a potato that slowly rotated in the air, the peel sliding off in one long, narrow strip. He looked up and smiled at Lily.

"I wouldn't be a cook without magic," he said. "It's too much work the Muggle way."

She grabbed a spare stool and settled in on it next to Caradoc. "Thought you could use some company down here."

"I would never say no to visitors."

He probably wouldn't, Lily thought, but not always because he actually wanted them there.

She watched the peeled potato zoom back to the counter. "I'll reiterate my deep and abiding love for your cooking."

He directed his wand at another potato that flew to hang over the bucket. "I'm glad it's so well received."

He was kind, yes, but not the most naturally talkative person. He might not bring it up himself, but he'd probably answer, if she asked.

So she did.

"James said you're the only Muggle-born person on the crew."

If Caradoc was surprised or bothered, he didn't show it. "Yes, that's true."

"And how…how is that?" Lily crossed one leg over the other. "Being Muggle-born and a part of the wizarding world."

He tilted his head in contemplation. "It wasn't so bad, at first. I didn't even realize there was a perceived difference about Muggle-borns."

"Did most people look down on you for it?"

"Not most of them," he said thoughtfully. "Some, yes, although I don't think they all recognize how deeply they feel it. They said things, or made it clear they thought things, that were worse than they believed them to be."

"Like what?"

"Like…like if I didn't get a spell right away, they'd look at me, like, _of course _you didn't get it right. They wouldn't really say it, but you'd know."

"Did Severus ever—I mean, he never said anything like that to me."

"I'm afraid I can't say," Caradoc said gently. "He and I never really spoke."

"But you must have heard about the things he said. Everyone else…."

"I did hear about some things he said, but I can't say I ever heard them from him directly."

Even if Severus had never said a bad word to Caradoc, that didn't mean he had never said them to other people, or that he wasn't Dark. Whatever being "Dark" meant, anyway, besides the obvious connotation of not being particularly good.

"From what I've heard," Caradoc said, "Severus was kind to you. And I think that matters. A lot."

"It counts for something, anyway." She uncrossed her legs and fixed him with a tight smile. "But you liked it at Hogwarts? Even though you were Muggle-born."

"Oh," Caradoc sighed. "I loved it. After growing up like we did, finding other people like us…I wish you'd been able to see Hogwarts Before."

She'd never talked about this topic before—at least, not with anyone but Severus, and he'd never been able to relate—but Caradoc had a certain welcoming air to him, a way his eyes focused on hers, listening intently. They were kin, in a way.

She looked down at her lap. "My parents thought they'd have a hard enough time marrying me off without me being a trained witch on top of it."

"I suppose they didn't realize you could have met a decent husband at boarding school."

"Marrying a wizard wouldn't have been appropriate, not by their standards."

Caradoc nodded. "My parents didn't mind the idea of a wizard in the family. They thought I could come back and find ways to help them after I'd learned some things. Of course, they didn't realize that I wouldn't be allowed to do magic outside of school until I came of age. Or that's how it would have happened, if the Ministry hadn't fallen."

"You had your wand, though. You could have helped even if What's His Face was in charge."

"I wanted to, more than anything. My mother hurt her leg, and she needed help around the house. But I had other things to do."

Lily frowned. "Like become a cook on a pirate ship."

He offered her a sympathetic look, but it didn't help her understand any better. "James asked me to," he said, "and I couldn't say no."

"Of course you can say no," Lily said, trying not to come off as harsh. "He's not some omniscient god."

Caradoc was easily the kindest person on the ship, but to choose the life of a pirate over helping his parents….

"A mutual friend of ours," he said, "pointed out it might be in my parents' best interest if no one knew where to find them. If I can't visit them, it's much less likely that they'll be tied directly to me, and much less likely that they'll be targeted by You Know Who."

A burning shame coursed through Lily. "That's—that's not a terrible motivation," she said. "Protecting your parents."

"I'm normally not one for cooking, but James asked me to do it for his crew."

"Well, he made a wise choice." She nodded toward the stack of clean, dry dishes next to the sink. "You're brilliant at it."

He smiled, thin but genuine. "Thank you."

"But if you don't like cooking," she felt compelled to point out, "you could find other work, you know. Become a real crew member on a ship, or hide out in France, or any number of things."

"No," Caradoc said, still smiling, "that's all right. I'm right where I'm supposed to be."

* * *

**A/N**: I say I don't like author's notes but then I keep using them - hypocrite, I know, but I thought I'd share a couple answers to frequently asked questions about the map:

1) The resemblance of the shapes on the map to the Hallows symbol is 100% coincidental. I hadn't even noticed until people started asking about it.

2) They are not looking for Horcruxes.

3) You have nine more weeks to solve the map before the characters do. (A couple people made excellent progress last week! Good work, Sarah and Zeina.)

I will answer all questions about the map truthfully. Feel free to send me questions/ideas about the map through a review, a PM, or a tumblr ask. I'm tagging all tumblr asks about it as "td map" so you can see what other people have already asked (there's a link to view all these posts on my profile).


	7. Full Moon

**Chapter Seven – Full Moon**

"I want to ask something," James said, sitting down to dinner that night, "but I'm afraid you'll mark it off-limits."

Lily draped her napkin over her lap. "If you want to waste a question, I won't stop you."

"It's just that it's the obvious question. And maybe it's a waste, but I've got all the time in the world, I suppose." He picked up the bottle of wine. "How did you become a thief of thieves?"

"Well deduced, Captain Potter." She bent over to pet Algernon's head while James poured. "I don't want to talk about that, especially if you won't tell me how you became a pirate."

"You were born into piracy, but by your own estimation you're not a pirate."

"You are paying attention, aren't you?" She sat upright again and Algernon meowed in annoyance. "I'd say I'm impressed but that's a lie."

"There's got to be _some_ level of detail you can give me about being born into piracy. Anything at all. You can't leave me with that one fascinating fact and move on."

"Not that I'm sorry to disappoint, but I'm afraid you'll have to ask the right question if you want to know anything more."

"Very well." He flashed her a smile. "What did you mean by a pirate by birth? I don't think that's part of how you became a thief of pirates, is it?"

"I could argue it is."

"You can argue whatever you want, but what's your incentive to do so?"

She sighed. If he really intended to pursue the line of inquiry, it would be in her interest to give him what he wanted. And maybe it would convince him she was who she said she was. It just burned to be forced to discuss things she'd prefer not to.

"It's as simple as it sounds," she said. "My mother was a pirate."

"Mother. Interesting." He ignored Algernon pawing at his shoe, begging for a scrap of fish. "I did assume father – what about him?"

Willingly admitting to her mother's profession would have been easier than this. But telling him about her father struck deep, a revelation she hadn't told anyone since leaving home.

It had made sense to avoid the issue among pirates. Women of the nobility were kidnapping targets, and she hadn't been about to hand herself up on a silver platter for ransom.

But James wouldn't do that. At least, she was fairly confident he wouldn't. He was too obsessed with finding his treasure – whatever was buried there had to be worth more than the entire Evans fortune, if he was pursuing it with such doggedness.

And he'd asked, and she was obligated by her own integrity to tell the truth within the game.

Technically, anyway.

"He was a good man," she said. "Did different sorts of business."

"Who's offering half-answers now?"

"It's a complete answer – your question was very vague. How is a poor, uneducated thief like myself supposed to know how to interpret your meaning?"

His mouth curved back in a half-grin. "Oh, yes, you certainly need coddling. Very well, you innocent young babe, ask your questions. Don't think I'm dropping this."

"I'd never presume to know your intentions," she said airily. "But my first question: was anyone on this ship a pirate before they joined your crew?"

He shook his head.

"And you personally asked them all to join you?"

He nodded.

She raised her cup and arched an eyebrow at him. "Reduced to nonverbal communication?"

But he seemed to barely process what she said, instead tapping the edge of his plate with his knife. "What was your father's profession?"

There was nothing for it. It would come out sooner or later.

"Earl," she sighed. "Now, what do you—"

"No," James said, eyes going wide.

"Yes. And?"

"You're a noble pirate!"

"I am _not_ a pirate."

"But you're the daughter of an earl! And a pirate! You must admit, that's dead unusual."

"Your world experience astounds me."

"Look, I don't—I don't care, you know. Sirius is noble in the wizarding world, much as he hates it."

Sirius might have been the rebellious heir, but Lily's running away had been simultaneously a rebellion and a fulfillment.

Not that she had any intention of discussing that with James.

"My turn, I believe," she said, with enough confidence that he went along with it, his mind apparently still mulling over her noble blood.

"I eagerly await your question."

"Well," she drawled, "men like you only want one thing."

"I've heard that, yes."

"Given that you're after treasure—"

"Is that what they're calling it these days?" he asked, his eyes flicking down.

"Mm, we can if you like."

"I'll think on it. What was your question?"

She cocked her head and considered him. "Why did everyone come running when you assembled this crew of misfit pirates?"

"Misfit pirates. I like that." He smiled to himself, just a little. "They came because we're friends."

"But why would they just join up with you, leave everything behind? They don't seem particularly greedy."

"Intertwined with my piracy, I'm afraid." He offered her a consoling smile, and it actually reached his eyes.

"Nothing you can give me? Nothing at all?"

"I've loads of innuendo, if you like. Which you haven't really been into so far, but that doesn't mean I don't have plenty available."

"More than treasure?"

He had so many smiles, each one a distinct, clear entity. This one came easily, a crooked, sharp line. "You think I spent six years at boarding school without picking up a hundred words for treasure?"

"No, but as someone who's spent the last two years on pirate ships, I'm certain I've got at least two hundred."

"I love a woman with a good vocabulary."

"I'd classify my vocabulary as better than _good_, thank you. While you were faffing about at Hogwarts, some of us were devouring every book in our admittedly outstanding library. I like to think of my vocabulary as stellar. Or unparalleled. Or superlative."

"Slow down, Lily, we're not even to dessert yet. You've got to let a man breathe before drown him with your grasp of the English language."

"What, should I make you work for it?"

"There is that saying about buying the cow when you can have the milk."

"You're not exactly monogamous with your metaphors, are you?"

"Nah," he said, leaning his chair back on two legs, wine held in one hand. "I'm a veritable metaphor harlot."

Algernon had come back over to Lily, and he looked up at her. He didn't beg for fish thing time, instead staring at her knowingly.

Lily pretended she didn't see and sipped her wine, pretending that James looked stupid leaning back that way and not at all dashing with that faint shadow of stubble on his face.

Thankfully, Algernon couldn't say anything.

Still. She dropped him a piece of fish to buy his silence.

* * *

James was…something else. He'd been so utterly reasonable since she'd come on board, asking without demanding, persuading rather than insisting. Mostly, anyway. It almost made her feel guilty for trying to solve his treasure map.

Almost.

Because solving wasn't stealing. It was mostly fun, something to keep her mind busy. She'd spent enough time on ships to have seen people go dumb or mad with boredom, and she wouldn't be one of them.

Although conversing with James could be considered a mental exercise in and of itself.

All the same, she sat poring over the map that night while James lounged in the crow's nest.

After examining the map several times, the Latin words were honestly more baffling than the shapes. Lily could see from Peter's work that they didn't string together into any sensible order, and there were no obvious anagrams to be made. She bent over, eyebrows drawing together.

There had to be some sort of pattern or clue. The only thing she'd noticed, the starred cross, hadn't helped her yet.

Based on the new notes Lily found, Peter had tried his hand at translating again. _A stormy sea comes after a sad wind. It can be hard not to follow fate_.

Peter seemed to be fixated on some of the longer Latin strings, however poor a job he was doing at it. Lily would let him work on that for now, and searched for some of the other clues on the map instead.

One of the Latin words was _navigatio_. Navigate. As in the ship had to navigate somewhere….

She let her eyes trace over the letters again and again. Why would the mapmaker tell them what they already knew? Obviously they had to navigate. That was what maps were for….

She frowned.

The writer was normally very tidy but he'd missed a spot of ink under the o.

Her eyes slid west onto _aecor_. He'd dropped another spot of ink under the e there, but nowhere else near the word. Just one tiny, insignificant dot.

Lily quickly scoured the rest of the map and found five more specks of ink, each dot clearly under one letter of a Latin word.

She grabbed a scrap of parchment from the pile and wrote down the dotted letters.

_UNESOAC_

Seven letters, one for each of the single Latin words. That could be one word, or two. Or even three, really, with the a.

It might have been nothing. It might have been a fluke. But at least she _felt_ like she was making progress.

Taking a page from Peter, she set out creating anagrams.

She'd run through half the combinations when she heard a creak outside the library door. Her free hand dropped onto the map and her piece of parchment, and froze.

Dorcas threw open the door and stalked inside.

Lily held her breath, her palm damp against the map, her heart thudding painfully. She flinched when a drop of wax landed on her hand, and righted her candle, keeping her eyes on Dorcas.

Thankfully Dorcas was not one to dither. She grabbed a book off the shelves across from Lily, spun around, and stomped out to the main deck again.

As soon as the door slammed shut behind Dorcas, Lily scrambled to roll up the map and shove it back in the cabinet. She snuck out onto the main deck, crept over to the edge, and let the wind yank the parchment full of anagrams out of her hand.

It would be annoying to start over, but better to lose her work than a limb.

* * *

Lily had picked up on the crew's shift schedule within two days, and within three had found herself settled in as part of it. She had mornings with Marlene, afternoons with Remus, dinners with James, and evenings with the crew and the map.

But on Lily's sixth day on board, Remus never came up for lunch. Caradoc began serving without him, and no one else spoke out to insist that he wait.

At first Lily said nothing either. Remus might have fallen ill, or had some special duty that day.

But then Sirius smacked Peter on the back of the head over something—Lily had missed what had sparked it—and Marlene slumped in her seat, picking at her food.

Two nights, Remus had said, until the full moon.

Even Caradoc's cooking seemed uninspired after she remembered.

From then on the sun moved quicker than it ever had before, and Lily spent the afternoon alone, trying not to wonder about whether she'd hear howling that night. After the others left, she nicked a piece of parchment from the bookshelf and jotted down the letters from the map.

The closest she came to a seven letter word made of the dotted letters was oceans or ounces. It made no sense as oceans – of course they were in an ocean—but ounces seemed to make even less sense.

She could have tried another tack besides anagrams, but it just seemed logical somehow – she couldn't think of another reason the mapmaker would have added those dots. And their unique placement—one per word, each hidden in plain sight—screamed that they weren't an accident.

Whenever she heard someone approaching the common room, she shoved the parchment scrap down her dress, to be dropped into the ocean at a later time. Eventually, though, she gave up on cracking the letters and wandered out on the deck.

But when Marlene, who'd stayed up for an extra shift, misfired a spell and tore a hole in a sail, James shouted for her to go inside, and Lily followed her back into the common room. Marlene declined her offer to play cards, so Lily read next to her until Marlene finally went to bed in the late afternoon.

Marlene had provided some level of distraction, but now, alone again, Lily couldn't focus on her book. Her mind supplied endless imaginings of what it was like, changing into a wolf, and how awful it must be, and what the chances were that he'd escape and bite the crew.

When the stars were just starting to emerge, Algernon wandered into the common room and hovered inside the door, clearly waiting for Lily.

She sighed and set her book aside. As much as she'd mentally taunted James for this very act, she understood his cat perfectly.

She followed him to the ladder to the gun deck, where he sat down, blinking at Lily.

"You want to go down?" she asked.

He looked at her like she was an idiot, and she scowled.

"I'm the one doing the favor here."

But she liked Algernon, so she awkwardly finagled him under one arm and tried to climb down the ladder.

It became immediately apparent that she'd underestimated the challenge of climbing a ladder while holding a cat, and she'd only managed to climb down two rungs when she heard Peter behind her.

"Here," he said, stretching up his arms toward her.

She bent as low as she could, and Peter pulled Algernon out of her arms.

"Thanks," she said, dropping onto the ground. "He insisted."

Peter smiled at Algernon, who fidgeted in his arms. "He likes being around Remus. Thinks it helps, somehow."

"Well, it makes him feel better than doing nothing, I imagine."

"We're just about to go in." Peter handed Algernon back to her. "Hold him until we've shut the door?"

"Er, all right."

Remus, who looked as pale as the moon that tormented him, sat hunched over in bed. Sirius wrapped an arm around his shoulder and helped him to his feet, and together they shuffled forward to climb down to the orlop deck, with Peter, Lily and Algernon a few steps behind them.

Remus moved slowly, awkwardly, like his feet weren't his own, but Peter and Sirius helped him along, past the shelves and candles. Barrels that Lily assumed normally filled the magazine had been moved to line the wall outside instead.

Lily's eyes widened when Sirius began to shut the door with him and Peter still inside.

"What are you—" she started to ask, but her question died at Sirius's stern look.

The door clanged shut, and Lily sat there, unable to do anything, and without the slightest clue as to why they'd trapped themselves in a room with a werewolf on the night of a full moon. Algernon sprang out of her hands and curled up on the ground in front of the magazine door, looking fierce.

Lily sighed and climbed back up to the gun deck, past a sleeping Marlene, and kept on until she'd walked right up to James at the helm.

He tried to smile when she came up the steps, but it didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Well, this is the worst," she said, leaning backwards on the rail in front of him.

"Yeah." He stepped around the helm and rested his forearms on the rail next to Lily. "I'd go down if I didn't have to take care of the ship. But it's pointless to just sit outside the room, I suppose."

"I don't think so," Lily said softly.

He shrugged.

"Are Sirius and Peter…. Will they be all right in there? With him?"

"Hm? No, they're safe. Don't worry. They know spells to protect themselves."

"They'd risk that? To protect us?"

James hummed in response and looked out at the horizon. "Not just us. They protect Remus, too. It helps, having them in there."

Regardless of their skill as wizards, from what Lily knew, no sane person would willingly hang around a transformed werewolf for a minute, much less all night. She'd seen a protective glint in Sirius's eye, though, and how he'd stridden into that room without fear. Peter didn't radiate every emotion the way Sirius did, but he hadn't hesitated for a moment before locking himself up with a werewolf, either.

"Is it awful," she asked quietly, "being a werewolf?"

James smiled without humor and ducked his head. "Remus doesn't complain about it—not ever, stupid git—but I've never seen anything more gruesome than his transformation. And I've seen a man lose his insides."

Lily swallowed loudly. "You've seen him transform, then? Done those spells?"

"If the magazine would hold me I'd be in there myself."

The tense line of his shoulders stood profiled against the moon hanging low in the sky, his head still hanging.

She thought of doing it, and then told herself she shouldn't, and then told herself she must, and then she reached out and squeezed his hand.

She nearly pulled back at the shocked expression he shot at her, but his hand had already clasped back, unrelenting in its grip.

"You're a good friend," she said, for lack of other options.

"Thanks." He looked down at their entwined hands, quirked a half-smile at it, and pulled his hand loose.

Lily was no stranger to the fluttering in her stomach. She wasn't fool enough to pretend she didn't know what it meant.

But clearly she was fool enough to get it in the first place.

He was holding her captive.

He was a pirate.

He had really good hair, yes, but she told her stomach it was stupid and wrenched her gaze out toward the sea.

"I'm going to—go," she said.

He nodded, and she fled.

* * *

Lily awoke plenty of times in the night, every groan of the ship or footfall of someone coming to bed rousing her to full alertness. At the snick of a trunk opening, she awoke gasping, sitting up straight in bed, blanket clasped to her chest.

Marlene gave Lily a reassuring smile. "Don't worry, they can't get out. Do you want a sleeping potion? Might be a bit groggy in the morning, but less than if you don't sleep at all."

Lily declined the offer, but then lingered on the verge on sleep, only to be jerked back into consciousness every time she realized she was about to actually fall asleep.

She awoke again in the morning at the sound of shuffling feet. Peter and Sirius helped a limping, shirtless Remus down the gun deck, his arms wrapped around their shoulders. Lily's eyes fell on two new vivid gashes that ran along his chest.

They lay him on his bed, where Marlene sat waiting with her wand in hand. Remus groaned as he adjusted himself on the bed, a muffled, agonized noise, and Lily's heart broke, just a little.

Helplessness dragged at her, an ocean current pulling her down into the depths, and she had nothing to grab hold of.

She sat up to see over the cannon between her and Remus. Marlene had set to work at once, murmuring spells as she trailed her wand along his wounds. They didn't disappear, but the blood vanished and the swelling lessened, and the lines on his face lessened, at least a little.

Sirius and Peter brought Algernon up from the orlop deck and collapsed into their own beds, while Lily sat there, incapable of moving or offering anything. Algernon climbed onto her lap, and her hand started idly running along his back, grateful for something to do.

Marlene applied a salve to Remus's chest, and then another to a fresh bruise on his palm, gently kneading it in. He smiled at her weakly, saying something Lily couldn't make out. Marlene let out a low chuckle.

Lily nearly left—they seemed to be having a private moment—but settled for looking away. She couldn't leave, not yet, and not only because she didn't want to draw attention to her gawking. Instead she focused on Algernon's rough fur beneath her palm. He needed a bath.

Marlene stroked Remus's hair back from his forehead before bundling up the jars in a cloth. She threw a quick smile at Lily, tucked her potions into her trunk, and disappeared up to the main deck.

"It's not as bad as it looks," Remus said, although his subsequent groan said otherwise.

"I doubt that," Lily said.

Algernon leapt out of her lap and trotted around the cannon to lie down next to Remus.

"I've had worse nights," Remus said.

"Is this the result of a good night?"

"No." He rolled his shoulder, and grimaced. "The wolf doesn't care for being on a ship."

"You could rethink your lifestyle choices."

Remus let out a low, deep laugh that mutated into a haggard cough. "That's very thoughtful, Lily, but believe me, there's nowhere else I'd rather be."

* * *

The sun shone high in the sky when Lily emerged onto the deck, its rays half hidden by tall, billowing clouds that looked like painted brush strokes. Marlene stood nearby, bespelling some ropes to reweave themselves into the rigging on the main mast, but Lily passed her by and instead swung by the common room for a piece of fruit before retreating to the forecastle deck. The sun helped chase away the crisp memory of Remus's bleeding chest, the brisk air fresh and welcome on her face.

She heard the door to the library open in the distance behind her, and her body turned automatically, her lips curling into a smile.

Her smile fell.

It was just Sirius emerging from the library. He paused, looking around the ship, and spotted Lily. He shot her a smug grin, and made his way up to the helm for his shift.

A cocky smile from James was endearing. From Sirius, it was unbearable.

Still. She had things to say to him, and she was no coward.

She marched down a set of stairs and up another, until she was directly in front of him.

"Hi," she said.

He raised his eyebrows, the picture of a bored lord, if most lords made a habit of practically lounging on pirate ship helms.

"I know you prefer pretending I don't exist," she said, "but I needed to say something, and then I'll go, all right?"

He waved a lazy hand through the air. "Then say it."

She pulled her shoulders back and shook her hair behind her shoulders. "I think what you did for Remus—whatever it is—is really brave. He deserves friends who'll do that sort of thing for him."

If Lily hadn't seen Sirius scowl at her every day for the past week, she might not have been able to tell the difference between when he was actually annoyed, and when he was just feigning it.

He was definitely pretending now.

"Yeah, well," he said, shrugging off something invisible, "someone's got to or he'll tear himself to shreds."

"Good," she said firmly. "Well, that's it. We can go back to pretending the other doesn't exist now."

"Brilliant."

"Right."

"Also," he said, as though it were only barely relevant, "James won't have time for dinner with you tonight."

"Oh. Well. Thanks for telling me."

He started to roll his eyes, and she turned around to hurry down the steps.

It was probably nothing. It was probably related to the shift changes or their mission or…something. It probably wasn't about her at all.

All the rationalizations she could imagine didn't matter, though. Her chest still twinged, and she retreated to the forecastle deck.

* * *

With Remus out of commission, everyone on the crew pulled extra shifts, leaving Lily to entertain herself after lunch. She tried to read, and tried to play chess against herself, and even tried just staring out at the sea, but nothing interested her. She fidgeted when seated, and wanted nothing more than to lie down after standing on the deck for ten minutes.

Mostly, annoyingly, she thought of James, and his wind-tousled hair, and his ever-moving mouth, and his oh so faint stubble.

She hadn't thought of anyone this way in a very long time.

On the one hand it felt like what she thought heights must do for other people, an exhilarating thrill well worth the danger.

But while others found a certain rush in significant heights, Lily was terrible at them. Thinking of James that way made her feel like she was in the crow's nest again, with nothing but a thin railing between her and a perilous freefall.

Normally when she felt any sort of stirring she threw herself in, like she had with Sam. They'd fallen into a mutually beneficial relationship the first night they'd met, perfectly understanding each other without speaking the words.

But James….

Presumably she'd be on board a while longer yet, and she couldn't very well spend the whole time wondering whether his palms were rougher than hers.

And besides, he'd flirted with her. He'd admitted he found her beautiful, and his attention never wandered far from her when she was around.

She wouldn't have minded some relief on board, not with the baseline level of anxiety she faced just by being trapped around Sirius and Dorcas.

It would be good for both of them, and probably loads of fun. He was playful, and generous. Surely he'd make it worth her while. She could certainly make it worth his.

She skipped out on dinner—she wasn't going to sit in a room with only Peter and Dorcas for company if she could avoid it—and pilfered a snack from the galley after Caradoc brought up dinner.

She couldn't borrow another dress from Marlene, who was sleeping, but she tried to make her hair look as presentable as possible and clattered up the ladder to the main deck.

She stole through the dark library, stepping lightly out of habit, but then hesitated in front of his door.

Maybe this wasn't the best idea, but she—she wanted to try, if nothing else. It made sense, it was practical, and…she wanted to know if he kissed like she thought he would.

She knocked on the door, just once.

At first she heard nothing, no footsteps or comments to Algernon. He wasn't necessarily inside, of course – she hadn't checked to make sure he wasn't in the common room.

But soon enough he opened the door.

"Er," he said. "I've already eaten."

"So have I."

"Then…did you need something?"

"Yes. May I come in?"

He studied her for a moment before fully opening the door for her. She passed through and sat down on the edge of his table, now cluttered with parchments.

He stood next to the open door, arms folded, waiting expectantly. Something so simple shouldn't have been so endearing. It might not have been if he hadn't been wearing that bloody hat of his.

She slowly crossed one leg over the other. "I've been a bit bored," she said, keeping her voice low and smooth.

"Hmm," he said.

"And I thought, maybe, you could help me keep entertained."

"I'm only fun when I'm talking to my cat, and he abandoned me for the evening."

She ducked her head, her hair falling forward to frame her face. "I'm sure we could think of something else to keep ourselves occupied."

He raised his eyebrows. "I can't help but feel you've something specific in mind. But my Legilimancy's always been crap."

"Well," she said, drawing out the word. "I've heard physical exertion can be very helpful on ships. To use different muscles, and all."

He kicked the door shut with one easy movement and sauntered over to her, hands in his pockets.

"Mm, haven't heard that before." He came to a halt in front of her, her foot nearly grazing his shin. "I liked the treasure euphemism better, all things considered."

"I'm flexible," she murmured, reaching up to play with the shirt strings around his collar.

"In more ways than one, I should think."

"Oh," she said, pulling on the cords, enough that they drew tight, enough for her to use it as leverage to pull his chest down toward her, "more than you can imagine."

In one swift movement, she stood up, pulled his head down toward her, and captured his lips in a kiss.

Fortunately, he was better than she'd expected, unrelenting and demanding.

Unfortunately, the kiss lasted about five seconds.

He abruptly stepped back, and she slackened her grip on his shirt strings to avoid strangling him.

"Actually I'm feeling plenty relieved," he said, eyes flicking about the room. "So I don't think I'll be much help."

"Not even to do a girl a favor?"

The line of his throat bobbed as he swallowed. "Well, the thing is, and this is coming from me, mind you, it seems like a bad idea."

One of his hands had wandered up to clasp the back of his neck, and he wouldn't meet her eyes.

Lily was no fool.

"Right." She stood up and brushed imaginary dust off her dress. "I mean, if you think I can't keep it from the others—"

"That's not—I mean, for one thing, I'm holding you prisoner."

"And for two?"

His eyes finally found hers, but they were hard. "The one I gave should be plenty of reason for you, I should think."

There wasn't actually a thread pulled tight around her heart, but it certainly felt like it, sharp and pinched. "I'm sorry if I misread," Lily said, her cheeks heating. "I'll just—I'll just leave, then."

"I think you should."

"Right. I suppose…good night, then."

"Good night."


	8. Unfettered

**Part II**

"Caelum, non animum, mutant, qui trans mare currunt."  
(Those who run across the sea change their Heaven and not their soul.)

—Horace

**Chapter Eight – Unfettered**

"Oi."

Lily's eyes snapped open, her arm flying up to shove away the person leaning over her.

A hand grabbed her arm.

"It's me," James said.

Lily's brain supplied the alluring thought that maybe he'd changed his mind, but his face, shadowed in the low light of his wand, spoke of anything but.

"Obviously," she said curtly.

"Come with me."

Lily looked past him toward the far wall of the ship, where faint light strained through the thin gaps around the gunport.

"I'll be up soon enough," she said. "You'd better have woken me up for something good."

"We're about to take port."

A ray of hope shot through Lily. "And you're letting me go?"

"The opposite."

It had seemed like maybe she was getting through to him, that he was warming to her, but clearly she had completely misread him.

"Right," she said, and she was definitely not feeling like she was going to cry because that was pathetic, even if everything seemed hopeless. "Lovely."

"Come on. I'm taking you to the magazine."

Her throat felt completely better, then, not tight at all.

He could have knocked her out with magic, or manacled her to another shipmate. But he couldn't have picked a better location than the magazine, as far as Lily was concerned.

"I'm coming," she said, letting her voice sour.

She climbed down the ladder to the orlop deck after him and, arms folded, followed him past the shelves to the magazine. He wasn't looking at her more than necessary to ensure she was in tow, and when he did, it wasn't—he'd looked at her differently before. Or she'd been deluding herself, and her seduction attempt had fully turned him against her.

The steel door beckoned her from across the long room. It should have been ominous and threatening, but Lily's heart was racing with the tantalizing thought of freedom.

"So I'm just supposed to sit tight," she said as he inserted a large metal key into the keyhole, "and be bored out of my mind."

"You didn't want to wake up? Consider this a day of sleeping."

The James of two days ago would have offered her a pillow, or a book. This brusque version of James made her miss him, an aching knot in her chest.

He twisted the key and, heaving with his weight, pulled open the door.

Lily glared at him one last time and stepped inside.

"At least give me some light?" she said.

He cast a spell to light a lone candle on the wall behind her.

Most magazines wouldn't have had candles, of course, but she assumed the barrels stacked neatly around the room were spelled against accidental ignition. They hadn't been spelled airtight, though; her nose wrinkled at the acrid smell of gunpowder.

James didn't even apologize for locking her in, just nodded and shut the door on her. She heard him twist the lock, and then there was silence, leaving Lily with gunpowder, a candle, and a stream of light through the keyhole for company.

Even the stream of light vanished soon enough.

Which meant James had climbed up to the gun deck.

Which meant Lily was alone and theoretically unarmed.

She turned to the barrels around her and smiled.

* * *

She sat with her back against a barrel, tapping her feet on the ground. The ship had stopped rocking with the waves of the ocean half an hour ago, and had stopped moving entirely not long after.

She'd have liked to sleep a bit more to be ready for a desperate run, but her body nearly vibrated with anxiety.

This was her best bet.

They'd changed direction last night, more south than west, and it had been a little over a week since she'd come on board. They had to be landing in Portugal, or possibly the northern coast of Spain.

Her mind ran through the ports: A Coruña, Vigo, Oporto. She'd have preferred Lisbon—she knew someone who owed her a favor at the Tower of Belém—but they couldn't have arrived so far south so soon. Then again, by her estimate, they were already moving quicker than Muggle ships, but Lisbon still seemed too far off.

She made herself wait a good thirty minutes past the time when she was itching to leave, pacing in the small space between barrels to work off some of her frenetic energy.

Finally she could wait no longer.

She slipped her hairpin out, fed it into the keyhole, and with one quick turn she was free.

She gently pushed the door shut behind her and tiptoed across the orlop deck. She stopped near the ladder, trying to listen for footsteps or other rustlings above. Given the chance to go on land, the crew probably wouldn't have stuck around to sleep.

Still, caution wouldn't go amiss.

She stepped lightly onto the first rung of the ladder, and then another and another, until she could just peer her head over the floor of the gun deck.

As best she could tell, none of the crew lay between the cannons.

She crept up the rest of the way and crouched on the ground, eyes sweeping the room for movement. When she saw no evidence of the crew, she stood up and snuck down the deck, past empty beds and cannons, heart hurtling itself against her chest. When she reached the ladder at the end, she paused again.

Someone was on the main deck.

A man, based on the heavy footfalls.

One man, or even two, it didn't matter. She hurried back to her bed and groped around under the thin mattress.

Lit candle balanced precariously in her mouth, she poked her head above the main deck, eyes blinking at the bright sunshine.

They were in the river in Oporto, based on the way the orange rooftops of the city sloped gently away from the river. She'd been here once before, early on in her journeys. Most pirate ships wouldn't have pulled all the way into a pier for a brief stay, but magic probably made it easier.

Sirius stood below the main mast, his head tilted back to look up at the shroud, one hand gently waving a wand to fix a fraying knot halfway up.

Only an expanse of deck lay between her and freedom.

She climbed off the ladder, mind scrambling to remember anything about Oporto, and began slinking toward the gangway to the pier.

And then she abruptly stopped.

Some of her effects were still in James's cabin, tucked safely under his bed.

Money she could get within minutes of being on land, a dagger not long after, and the mokeskin pouch she could replace, albeit with effort.

But her necklace….

She'd taken nothing else when she'd stolen away from her parents' estate in the middle of the night. It was the one thing she'd never considered selling for food. She'd protected it from thievery on the first ships she'd crewed, before she'd got her pouch, and she'd hunted down the man who'd dared to take it from her after they'd shared a perfectly nice night together. She'd stolen it back, of course, along with his moneybag and his lunch.

She couldn't leave her necklace behind.

But James and Sirius were a matched set. James had probably offered to stay behind while his crew gallivanted around, and Sirius would have insisted on staying with him.

She needed to know if James was on board and, if so, if he was in his cabin. Which was to say she needed to get him out of his cabin and properly distracted, just long enough that she could run in and out of his room without being noticed.

Her assets included her candle, a mostly empty box of matches, her hairpin, and her wits.

If only she had a weapon.

And then she remembered she did.

* * *

She awkwardly maneuvered up the ladder to the main deck again, this time a cannonball threatening to fall out from between her breasts and rip her bodice.

She liked to think that after her week and a bit on board, she'd learned something of James's character, and what would draw him out.

She didn't mean to knock Sirius out cold.

But when she heaved the cannonball against the side of his head, wincing before it even collided with his temple, he didn't cry out like she'd hoped he would. Instead he groaned and staggered forward, arms flailing to gain his balance and brushing against her chest. He slowly collapsed onto the deck, his wand rolling out of his hand.

She looked down at him, her lips pressing together. He would be fine. Probably. She wasn't that strong, and Marlene could Heal him when she got back. James might even be able to do something for him before the others returned.

But first, of course, she had to get James out on the deck.

She frowned. She had no method for luring him to his injured mate, save shouting for him.

Except she still had the cannonball. And cannonballs could be noisy.

She grabbed Sirius's wand off the deck, out of practicality rather than vengeance, and shoved it into her bodice, the effect rather like a corset. She took a few steps away and hurled the cannonball down onto the deck. It landed with a deep thud, and Lily's eyes flicked to watch the library door.

But no one came out.

She chased after the cannonball and picked it up from where it had rolled, raised it up in the air over her head with one hand, and flung it onto the deck again.

This time it landed louder, an unmistakably strange noise coming from someone who was supposed to be messing with the shrouds.

She hurled it twice more, and was debating how else to get James's attention when he finally sauntered out of the library, eyes fixed on a piece of parchment in his hand.

"Merlin's tit, Padfoot, would you mind letting a bloke—fuck!" His eyes had come up now, and found Sirius lying unconscious on the deck. He ran over to Sirius, parchment floating to the ground as he reached for his wand instead, and dropped into a crouch. "Fuck!"

Even though he'd just locked her up, Lily's gut twisted at the wrenching, wounded look she'd put on his face.

Still, she took her chance to dash through the library and into his cabin, where the gentle chiming of buoys in the harbor drifted in through his open windows. She sank to her knees next to his bed, setting the cannonball on the ground.

She yanked the drawer open, grabbed her pouch, and slammed it shut again. The noise hopefully wouldn't travel far enough to reach James on the deck, and in any case, speed was more important than subtlety. She shoved her mokeskin pouch into her bodice, hand scraping against the point of Sirius's wand, and stood up, picking up the cannonball with one hand.

She didn't want to have to use it on James, but she would for her freedom.

She spun around toward the door and had barely managed two steps when James appeared in the doorway, head ducked, eyes dark.

"Oh, sure." He was as calm and matter of fact as he'd been that night in Brest, only now there was a tinge of malice beneath the calm, like silk over steel. "I'm some innocent thief. I'd never hurt any of your crew."

Lily took two quiet steps backwards, toward the windows.

He stalked into the room, slowly, methodically, arm outstretched in front of him, wand ready to fire off a spell at a moment's notice.

Her eyes dropped to her weapons: a cannonball and a candle. Burning him wouldn't stop him, and she couldn't get around him quickly enough to bash his head from behind.

She stepped backwards again, glancing behind her to gauge the distance between her and the window.

"_Accio_ Lily's cloak," he said, voice whip sharp.

Lily cocked her head – he hadn't found her with a cloak, and what would it matter if she had one? But she had more important things to focus on. He was muttering a long, complicated spell, casting his wand in a wide arc.

From somewhere nearby, church bells rang out, loud and clear.

Lily glanced back at the windows again.

Of course.

She took a few more silent steps backward, spared another look at James, and dropped the cannonball out of the open window.

It landed in the water with a gulping splash.

James's head snapped to face the window. He didn't waste time running over to see what had gone out, instead whipping around and grabbing the door handle to fling it open.

Lily allowed herself a silent, deep breath.

But then he stopped hard in the process of launching himself through the doorway, catching himself on the frame.

He turned back around slowly, grinning without humor.

"Very clever," he said. "But I know what a person sounds like falling off my ship, Lily. Better than you, I imagine."

She suddenly had a vivid image of him forcing someone to walk the plank at wandpoint, and she froze.

But only for a moment.

He'd started muttering again, an eerie sort of chant, his wand ebbing up and down in front of him.

She couldn't sneak up on him, and he'd easily best her in combat.

She stepped gently to the right, turned around, and swung one foot up to rest on the windowsill, her free hand gripping the frame. She had her other foot up before she could doubt herself, and then she dove, the flame of her candle burning against her hand.

The cool water of the river engulfed her, her dress tangling around her legs. She sank, deeper and deeper, until she could slow her descent. She opened her eyes, but the water was murky, only the marbled sunlight above giving any indication of direction.

She squeezed her eyes shut against the brackish water and kicked hard, powering herself up toward the surface. She found the edge of the ship and followed it up until her head broke the surface.

She sucked in a lungful of air and swung her head around to get her bearings. She could try to climb up onto the pier, but James would catch her there for sure. She could try to swim directly to land—it wasn't far—but he'd see her there, too.

He'd see her everywhere. Her candle and matches were soaked, and she wouldn't be using either for a while.

She whirled around toward the far side of the river and grinned.

Any good traveler knew and adored Oporto's main industry.

Wine.

Dozens of simple wooden sailboats floated down the river toward the ocean, all carrying stacks and stacks of wine barrels.

A bolt of red light landed on the water above her shoulder, and she cursed, ducking down again.

She dived deeper, out of view, and began swimming toward the center of the river. She allowed herself to come up for air once she couldn't stand it, but the anti-Muggle charms around the ship had to end somewhere. If she could just get past them, James wouldn't risk revealing his magic by casting at her anymore.

She resurfaced again, this time in the middle of the wide river. A wine ship nearly clipped her on the shoulder, and she launched herself away from it.

After checking that she wasn't in the line of any more boats, she turned back toward James's ship. She couldn't see him on board, or on the pier. He could probably see her, though, her red head an unmistakable sight in the middle of the water.

But he couldn't get to her, at least not right away.

She kept treading water, trying to decide whether to hitch a ride on one of the wine ships or to simply swim to the far side of the river. But a ship would require taking port somewhere, and eventually he could track her along the river, waiting for her to land.

What she needed to do was disappear into the winding, narrow streets, duck into a shop or an inn, and hide until James gave up.

So she swam, underwater as much as possible. It took longer than swimming on the surface, but he'd have to work to follow her zig-zag path across the river.

* * *

She climbed up onto the pier across the river to countless stares. She ignored them, though, and half-ran along the pier, her sopping wet dress clinging to her shaky legs.

She wiped her face off with her hand as best she could and pushed her hair out of her eyes, all the while moving, eyes on constant alert for dark-haired Englishmen.

A burly sailor stepped into her path, a sly grin on his face, but she deftly sidestepped him and continued on her path, her hurried footfalls rattling the wooden slats beneath her.

Her hand ached, and she looked down to see it clenched tight around her candle. She laughed, short and mirthless, and shoved it into her bodice with her pouch and the wand. They stuck out obviously under the wet fabric, but everyone would probably be too distracted by a dripping wet, red-headed white woman wandering the streets of Oporto to realize she had lumpy breasts on top of it.

Now on solid ground, and her legs quickly adjusting to land again, she headed directly into the city, past buildings that came in long, seamless strings. A dark-haired woman hung a wet pair of trousers over the railing in front of her door-length window and eyed Lily.

Lily shot her a smile and continued on.

Even though her body thrummed with energy from her escape, she still savored the thrill of being in a foreign city, even one she'd been in before. She never tired of hearing other languages swirling around her, or wandering down new streets. And Portuguese cities were beautiful, the exterior walls covered in intricately painted tiles.

Lily's parents had taken her to London once as a girl. London had an energy all its own, and at the time it had struck Lily as odd to be around so many strangers, even buffered as she was by the windows of the carriage. She'd pressed her face against the windows to watch endless people pass by until her father had pulled her back gently by the collar.

They'd stayed in a relative's house near Hyde Park without once stepping foot more than a block from the carriage or the house. She'd been _to_ London, but not _in_ London.

Her father had left cities as soon as possible to retreat to his estate, but Lily lived for cities. Every port had a flavor of its own, a pulse and a scent and a sound. Oporto moved slower than Lisbon, but the people were certainly not English. They spoke loudly and passionately, not minding if anyone overheard

She spotted a small food stall on a corner, small and dark, and ducked inside between rows of fruits and vegetables. The owner tried not to stare, and she soothed him with a wave and a smile. He nodded back, teeth showing in a hesitant smile.

She pretended to rummage through some unfamiliar fruit and then set them down, her back to the owner, angled so she could still watch for James. It was awkward, but she managed to make pulling her mokeskin pouch out of her bodice look at least somewhat natural.

The only coins she had in the Muggle side were French. She flipped the pouch and dug around, shoving Sirius's wand and the candle inside for safekeeping and pulling out a few spare bits of gold.

She reversed the pouch again and turned back to the owner, who looked perfectly perplexed at Lily's strange behavior.

But his grin turned genuine when he saw the gold in her hand.

She grabbed a loaf of bread and a handful of fruits – she hadn't eaten since dinner, and swimming to freedom took a lot out of a girl. Lily let him get a better deal than he was probably due in the interest of time. She had to move farther inland, farther from where James had last seen her.

The owner wrapped her purchases up in a cloth, and she stepped out onto the street feeling more like herself than she had in weeks. The sun was shining, she wasn't on a ship, and she was in a foreign city – it was as if her adventure on James's ship had never happened.

But she wasn't safe yet, not if James was determined.

She began a meandering path across the city, up through the sloping hills, keeping to the busy main streets. She circled back on herself, kept heading north, and then circled back once more, all the while breaking off small bites of bread.

She walked and walked, her dress and hair slowly drying off.

At long last she had a wand, but the few spells she'd learned from Sev didn't seem applicable in this situation. Mostly she would have liked a Drying Charm, given the way water still squished around her feet. She could have dried off her candle, matches, and her shoes, too, but instead Severus had taught her how to Levitate items and how to turn a beetle into a button. They'd taken their time moving through his spellbooks, confident that they had years to work together.

And then What's His Face had interfered.

A large shop window displaying maps and books caught Lily's eye. Although she'd had to leave James's treasure map behind, someone else might know of the mysterious treasure in the Azores, wherever those were.

She ducked in through the doorway and smiled, the unmistakable, welcoming musk of books washing over her. The shop reminded her of James's cabin, with books stacked in piles taller than she, spines facing every which way.

An elderly man in the corner glared at Lily, but she focused instead on a middle-aged man with long, dark hair who was speaking in rapid Portuguese with a young boy. They seemed to be negotiating over a worn book with gold lettering on the cover. After a minute the boy huffed and pulled a small coin out of his pocket.

When the owner had deposited the money in his coin purse, Lily approached him with a tentative smile.

"Buenos días," she said. She'd only picked up a little Spanish in her travels, but she'd managed to get by in Portugal with it before.

He nodded at her. "Bom dia."

"Azores Islands," she said hopefully.

He cocked his head at her and said something – she didn't understand the words, but he had clearly not taken her meaning.

She walked over to a map tacked to the wall. "Azores?" she repeated, pointing at the map.

But he frowned.

Her pronunciation must have been off. Lily's eyes flicked around the shop, and she found a parchment and quill set on a tall desk. She walked over, held her hands over the inkwell, and shot the owner a questioning look.

He joined her at the desk and waved for her to continue. She quickly wrote out _Azores_ _islands map_ in her best penmanship.

"Ah!" he said, and nodded. He strode over to a pile of parchments in a corner and flipped through them, the pages rustling.

He came back to the desk with a few parchments in hand and set them on top of Lily's note. He confidently said something that sounded an awful lot like Azores, with an accent Lily couldn't duplicate.

The map on top read _O arquipélago dos __Açores _in elaborate calligraphy.

Lily grinned. The pattern of islands outlined below was unquestionably the same one on James's treasure map.

"Where?" she said.

The owner looked confused again. Lily took the map of the Azores and walked over to the larger European map on the wall. She held up the small map against the big one and moved it around slowly, then turned around and gave him a hopeful look.

He said something else in Portuguese, his tone indecipherable to Lily, and moved to stand next to her. He pointed to the Iberian peninsula, at the dot labeled Porto, and drew his finger nearly due west a short distance.

He looked down at Lily for confirmation that that was what she wanted, and she smiled at him. The word Açores sat underneath his finger, next to a tiny string of islands.

Lily probably had to get to Lisbon to find someone with enough English language skills to tell her any rumors about treasure in the Azores, but that was a surmountable barrier.

"Gracias," she told the man, offering him a small piece of gold.

She left the shop beaming. The week and a half she'd spend on James's ship wouldn't be completely wasted if she could find someone who knew anything about this mysterious treasure.

Although continuing to move seemed the wisest course of action, there was also self-defense to consider. Until she learned more spells, she would need other methods to fight off James or anyone else. So far in her profession she'd got by with only her dagger, but considering some wizards wanted to kill or capture her, she needed something more.

After another hour of wandering through the streets, basking in the occasional breeze that wound between buildings, she finally stumbled across a blacksmith. Examining swords relied on touch and grip, not language, and she soon traded a large gold nugget for a sleek cutlass.

She felt calmer the instant she strapped it to her side. She might not be able to best James with a wand, but she was willing to bet even her amateur sword skills could best his, if he had any at all.

People looked at her differently when she wore an obvious weapon. They weren't used to seeing a woman with a cutlass—the shop owner had eyed her just as curiously, and had probably overcharged her—but people gave her a slightly wider berth now. She was no longer an object of interest, but rather someone to be respected. She liked that, and wondered why she hadn't taken to wearing one earlier. It certainly kept irksome men from bothering her.

All day she'd managed to keep to the main, more crowded streets. Assuming James was capable of following her this far, he would have had to get close if he wanted to avoid casting magic in public.

But her energy was quickly fading. She'd eaten half of her bread, but her feet would need a break soon.

She had to find shelter. An inn would have been easiest, especially after she'd lifted the coinpurse off a man on the street who'd leered at her, but it also offered the least protection. She didn't want a room to herself, not when she had wizards after her.

If she was going to sell her information, she'd find a bigger market in Lisbon. Fortunately, if there was anything she had experience in, it was arranging transportation. She'd have to go close to the river again to manage it, but finding a ship to spend the night on, tucked safely among a crowd of people, was her best bet for short-term security.

She wandered the streets some more, this time allowing herself to follow the downward slope of the city to the river. Soon enough she heard the caws of seagulls and began watching for the local sailor watering hole.

Her heart skipped when she saw a pale man in the distance, but he was brunette, and too short to be James.

She started following him, slowly narrowing the gap between them, until she could see several tattoos on his arms.

Within minutes he'd led her to a dark, dingy pub half-filled with unsavory, drunk sailors.

She marched in with her head held high. She'd played the innocent for James, but sailors were a different breed than pirates. In her experience, pirates had a great deal more honor than sailors, since they relied on no laws other than their own word. Most of the time, anyway. Sailors often needed more convincing.

She made quick work of negotiating with the soberest bloke in the room, a short, cleanshaven man with a half-full glass of lager in front of him, but his ship was heading north, and she moved on to the next least-troublesome looking man in the room.

He didn't speak much English, but eventually she walked toward the river at his side. With his light-colored hair and rough English, she pegged Peder as Dutch. He was about twice her height and although he seemed decent enough—he'd agreed to talk to his captain about stopping in Lisbon en route to Africa on her behalf—she kept an eye on where they were going in case he decided to try anything.

Her heart raced faster the closer they drew to the river. She tried to engage Peder in conversation, to make it apparent to James or his crew that they couldn't snatch her without someone noticing, but the language barrier got in the way.

Even as they crossed onto the pier, she remained on watch, eyes roving as she followed Peder up the gangway.

Like a proper merchant ship, plenty of sailors hung about the main deck. They didn't intend to leave until morning, but Lily had asked for a place to sleep, and, if Peder had understood, he'd agreed.

She pleaded her case to the captain, who spoke passable English. Normally she'd have negotiated much more frugally, but desperation interfered. If James or his crew had seen her get on the ship, they'd have guessed her escape strategy, and she might not have time to find another merchant.

She followed Peder below deck, ignoring the mostly curious looks of the other crew members. Some of them nudged their friends with eyebrows raised, but most of those looks stopped when they spotted her cutlass. She'd give that to James's crew, at least; she'd never felt unsafe there.

Although some of the Dutch crew might have taken her cutlass as a challenge, she felt reasonably protected when Peder showed her to a bed. The captain had allowed her on board, after all, and there were too many of them awake for anything untoward to happen before she awoke.

Arms and feet aching, she fell asleep within moments of hitting the pillow.

* * *

An arm shook Lily awake.

"Urgh, later, Marlene," she grumbled into her pillow.

"Come," Peder said.

Lily rubbed at her eyes with one hand as Peder pulled on the other, yanking until she stood up.

"Hmm?" she said. Right. She was on a Dutch merchant ship. No James.

"Captain."

Lily let him drag her toward the ladder up to the main deck. "The captain?"

"Come," he stressed, and Lily didn't see that she had much choice.

It was still afternoon when she climbed off of the ladder – she couldn't have slept more than an hour, although it felt like it had been much longer.

Lily's palms began to sweat as she followed Peder across the deck and into the captain's cabin. Before the crew had eyed her with a bit of lust, and a bit of curiosity, but now they watched her with narrowed eyes.

Peder opened the door for her and she smiled at him in thanks, but the limited amount of warmth he'd shown earlier had vanished.

She entered with trepidation, first noticing the captain sitting behind his desk, and then another man, this one tall, standing with his back to Lily. He wore a fine navy coat with gold trim on the shoulders, and a hat unmistakably from the English Royal Navy.

Her heart stumbled.

She could handle the Navy, but she knew that line of the shoulder, that commanding posture.

James turned around, a thoroughly smug grin on his face, and two rolls of parchment in hand.


	9. Pirate Smith

**Chapter Nine – Pirate Smith**

"Ah, Pirate Smith," James said.

"_What?_"

"I thank you for your assistance in my chase, Captain Adriaans," he said, his voice the very embodiment of authority. "It's international collaborative efforts like these that make our nations stronger."

"You've some nerve, pretending to be in the Navy," Lily said. "Captain Adriaans, this man is a pirate."

"Poor girl, simply can't stop lying. It's all that time she spends with her fellow pirates, you know. They're a bad influence."

"I'm not a _pirate._ I'm not even branded." She turned to the captain, just barely keeping herself from shouting, the blatant injustice of James's accusation clawing at her. "He's no evidence at all."

"I'm an agent of Her Majesty's naval forces," James said, offended. "And I have the appropriate paperwork." He took one of the scrolls out of his hand and waved it at her. "My credentials," he said, tucking it under his arm. He unrolled the other parchment, this one much more worn and ragged, and held it up for her to see.

The bastard had made a wanted poster for her, and had even added a surprisingly accurate drawing of her face. James's gambit was so sneaky, so underhanded—pirate, Lily silently reminded herself—and her hand twitched, nearly reaching for her cutlass.

Once again, though, she was outnumbered.

"An obvious homemade forgery," she said, trying to stall. She had to think through this, but her brain was floundering, her heart hammering. She couldn't have got so far only to be out-lied. "You've no more proof you are who you say you are than I do."

As true as that statement was, neither Peder nor Captain Adriaans seemed convinced by her argument. James looked the part of a royal officer, after all, and he carried himself with the appropriate demeanor, and he had documentation to substantiate his claims.

And, perhaps most significantly, James was a man. Men of proper society would never listen to a woman over one of their own gender.

All Lily had was her mokeskin pouch, a dress filthy from her swim and citywide trek, and a cutlass. In retrospect, she should have gone for a weapon less associated with pirates.

She stood with arms folded tightly, trying to hide her growing panic at the inescapable direction the situation was heading, as Captain Adriaans offered James a pair of manacles. There would be no running once she was chained, no distracting them and slipping away unnoticed.

"Good luck," Adriaans told James. "Catch more pirates."

"Will do, Captain." James turned to Lily with the manacles. "Are you going to cooperate?"

Peder didn't offer her the chance, though, shoving her chest into the wall and wrenching her arms behind her back.

"You're not even going to let a lady have her arms in front?" she said.

"You're a pirate," James said, snapping cold iron onto her wrists, "not a lady, and pirates are not to be trusted."

"Obviously," she muttered.

She refused to speak to or look at James as he pushed her down the gangway, keeping her head held high despite the dirty looks she got from sailors on the pier.

James walked at her side and kept a firm grip on her irons with one hand, her cutlass in the other. Even if she ran, no one would help her run away from a naval officer. If they'd been in a pirate port, perhaps, but not among honest merchants.

"Come on." James steered her over to a rowboat tied to the pier. "In you go."

He moved aside to let her hop down, but she took a step back instead, eyeing the city next to them.

"This would be much easier if you freed my arms," she tried.

"I was trying to offer you a bit of dignity," he said, his hand gripping her irons tightly again, "but fine, continue to be an enormous pain in the arse."

"I'll stop being a pain once you stop holding me captive."

"_You're_ the wronged party? Might I remind you, _you're_ the one who lied to me, _you're_ the one who tried to steal from me, and _you're_ the one who whacked my best mate in the head!"

She arched an eyebrow at him. "When you put it that way I sound bloody impressive."

"Oh, for fuck's sake. I'd push you into the boat if I weren't such a gentleman."

"Gentleman pirate? Is that your new claim?"

But James didn't respond. He seemed to be debating how to get the both of them in the rowboat without letting go of her.

"Just get in first," she said sweetly. "And I'll stand here and wait patiently."

He pressed his lips together and frowned. "This would be so much easier with magic." He glanced around and waved at a nearby sailor. "Oi! Help a bloke out?"

The sailor hesitated, and Lily held out hope, but then James shouted again, and this time the man came toward them. He didn't speak English, but James managed to indicate that he needed help getting his prisoner into the boat. The man obliged, holding onto Lily's irons until James had lowered himself into the boat.

James waved for the sailor to bring Lily to him. She started to crouch down, expecting to more or less hop into the boat on her own, but instead the sailor picked her up under her armpits.

"Oi!" she shouted. "I'm not a sack of potatoes."

She almost kicked out, but his grip on her was tenuous, and she couldn't swim in manacles if he dropped her. Reluctantly she forced her legs still.

"You could've got in willingly," James reminded her. "You chose this."

"Rubbish!"

James grabbed her legs, and the sailor slowly lowered her, until James's arms came around her midsection. He swung her around, nearly losing his balance, and then settled her feet onto the bottom of the boat.

It was humiliating.

She was also well put out that in spite of this embarrassment, her stomach had decided to throw a raucous party at being in such close, personal proximity to James.

He helped her sit on one of the slats across the boat and turned back to the pier.

"Cheers, mate," he said, tossing up a small gold coin up to the sailor.

The man nodded and wandered away, and James faced Lily again.

"All right, Smith. Let's go."

* * *

Sirius hauled her over the rail of the ship with more force than was strictly necessary, then shoved her at Dorcas, who gleefully grabbed onto Lily's irons.

They wore matching victorious smirks, and Lily's mind went momentarily blank at the horrid realization that she was back on this cursed ship with both of them.

James climbed over the rail while Peter secured the rowboat to the ship.

"Looking very impressive, Captain Potter," Marlene said, waggling her eyebrows at James.

He grinned at her and pulled his wand out of his pocket. A few swishes later and his clothes had reverted to normal.

"Show off," Sirius muttered.

James clapped him on the shoulder. "You're looking well."

"No thanks to her."

"Yeah, well, no retaliation, got it?"

_"Prongs."_

"We'll discuss this later, all right? After we've interrogated her." James beckoned Dorcas, and Lily stumbled at her push, falling into James's arms. "Marlene, join us in a minute. Lily, come along."

He frog-marched her into the library and forced her into a chair. She fidgeted, trying to get comfortable with her arms still awkwardly behind her. It was a losing battle.

Of course, under other circumstances, Lily wouldn't have minded being tied up and at James's mercy. Unfortunately he'd shown little interest in the more entertaining scenario her mind oh so helpfully provided.

He held onto her shoulder, keeping her in place, and moved to stand behind her. She flinched when he murmured a spell, and then relaxed when she felt the manacle fall away from one of her wrists.

But he didn't release the other wrist. Instead she heard him shuffling behind her, the chains of the manacles clinking, and she turned her head to see him hold the loose cuff around the table leg. He murmured a few spells, one at the manacle to make it fit around the table leg, another at the wood with no effect that Lily could discern, and a final one to fuse the table leg together with the floor.

If Sirius tried to retaliate, she wouldn't be able to stop him.

"I thought I'd bargained for my freedom on board," she said, repressing the panic welling up in her throat.

"You escaped. That ended the parley, as far as I'm concerned."

"Then I want a new parley."

"And I'm refusing."

"You can't refuse. It's parley."

"Who are you going to complain to about it? Sirius? Dorcas? I think even Marlene might be a bit peeved at you. Yeah, you're bloody impressive, all right. Bloody impressive at pissing people off."

"I have the right to parley."

"And _I_ have the right to protect myself and my crew, and I can't do that _and_ give you parley. So, not sorry, you lose out in this scenario." He glanced at the door. "I need to check in with my crew and then I'll come back to deal with you. I don't know—ah, McKinnon."

Marlene strolled into the room looking very chipper. "Here to serve, Captain. I think you should've kept the other hat. Much more regal."

"Search her, all right? Properly this time."

"I searched her plenty well last time. If I'd searched her any more thoroughly I think I'd have had my second lesbian experience."

He raised his eyebrows. "Regardless. Find everything this time, would you?"

"Aye aye, Captain."

James snorted and left, shutting the door behind himself.

"So," Marlene said, turning to Lily, "just us again, eh?"

Lily shrugged and looked away. If she opened her mouth, especially to Marlene, she might have done something stupid like confess how absolutely terrified she was. Marlene had been kind to her, but she wasn't going to free her, that much was obvious.

Marlene was almost an ally. But not really, not when it mattered.

Marlene sighed. "I'll let James do the interrogating. For now let's see if we can't get that dress off you without me slicing you open."

* * *

The shadows crept across the floor while Lily slumped in her chair. Marlene had thoroughly searched her and found all of her goods once more. She'd had the decency to give Lily a book from the shelf, though, and she'd extended the manacle chain so Lily could stand up and take a few steps away from the table.

But as best Lily could tell, she was well and thoroughly stuck in place.

Late in the afternoon, near dinnertime, she heard shouts through the closed windows, buoyant laughter, and someone running up and down the steps to the quarterdeck.

They were leaving Oporto.

Lily hadn't managed to escape.

For the first time, icy despair washed over her. If they were headed for the Azores, it would take them a couple of weeks to arrive, weeks during which she might have nothing to do but sit around and hope someone deigned to give her a book.

Even if she could endure the passage to the Azores, she couldn't begin to guess at how long they might be there searching for the treasure. If they decided to stay at sea while they puzzled over the map instead of taking port on one of the islands, Lily would have no chance of escape.

She'd tried her best to get away and it hadn't worked. He'd still found her and bested her and now she was stuck on this bloody ship _again_, maybe indefinitely, and some people on the ship wanted to _kill_ her, and now they might, actually, since she'd injured one of them.

She'd run and been clever and armed herself and it hadn't mattered at all. Her feet ached from running around uneven streets and her hair was a disgusting mat from her swim and every weapon she'd collected had been ripped from her.

Hot tears flooded her eyes, and she fought back a sob. She folded her arms, her blasted chain clinking as it moved, and curled over the tabletop, resting her arms on the table and hanging her head. A few drops rolled off her cheeks, dropping onto the wood.

Crying always made her face flush and her nose stuff up and her chest ache. Sometimes crying helped, leaving her feeling grotty but empty when she was done, but this was different, more miserable: Hope hadn't been this elusive, this distant, in years.

More tears spilled over as she wished for nothing more than to be back home, tucked up by the fire with her parents on either side of her, all of them reading while Petunia embroidered.

She never should have left home, never should have wandered onto James's ship, never should have thought she could run away from well-trained witches and wizards.

But she had and there was no way out.

Someone knocked gently at the library door.

Lily swiped her palms over her eyes and sniffed. "Come in."

Caradoc entered wearing one of his soft smiles, and carrying a tray full of steaming hot food.

"I thought after a long day of running you might be hungry," he said, sliding the tray in front of her.

"Have I told you that I'm madly in love with you?"

He didn't laugh, just broadened his smile a little, and sat down across from her. With a wave of his wand, he Conjured her a handkerchief, and she threw him a thankful look while she dabbed at her eyes.

"Sorry," she said. "Don't mind me."

"It's all right. It's not surprising you're feeling a little frustrated."

"Frustrated's only half of it," she said, and then she closed her mouth. Caradoc was kind, yes, but he was also part of the crew that didn't trust her, and the things she told him might end up back with James, or worse.

Still, he might not be a confidante at the moment, but he hadn't had to serve her a proper meal.

"Really," she said, "Thank you."

He nodded. "You're welcome."

She took a bite of the fish he'd brought her. "What did you do with your day on land?"

"Oh, I ate at a nice restaurant, picked up a few trinkets. Nothing like your cutlass, though."

"Funnily enough James saw fit to take that from me."

"I'm surprised you bought one at all."

"Why, should I have stolen it instead?"

"No," he said, smiling, "because you're a witch."

"Oh. Right. Well, I had Sirius's wand, but I'm—I don't know many spells."

"I suppose not." His eyes lit up. "Sirius threw a fit over you taking his wand."

Her mouth slanted into a grin. "Oh, I took it, all right. He went down awfully quick. I think his skull must be a bit thin."

He didn't verbally agree with her, but his smile widened just enough for her to notice. "Sirius can be difficult, sometimes."

"So long as by sometimes you mean during any hour between one and twelve, then yes, sometimes he is difficult. Why you keep him around…."

"He and James have been best mates for a long time."

"I noticed."

"I suppose you did." He pushed himself out of his seat. "I'll leave you to it. Although you should know, per James's instructions, that that knife doesn't work against human skin."

Lily blinked. "I didn't—"

"I know," he said, pushing in his chair. "I'm only following orders."

* * *

She sat alone again, thankfully tear-free but still morose, until James returned.

He'd never failed to ignite something in her, and she was terribly glad of it, if only to feel something other than depressed.

He leaned against the doorframe and sighed. "Where's Sirius's wand, Lily?"

"In the river," she said airily.

"You've really got to stop lying."

"I don't see why."

"Don't you want to get off this ship?"

"If you've already forgotten," she said, standing up and lifting her chin, her chain clinking, "I did get off your ship. But it's clear to me that you've no intention of letting me go because for whatever mad reason you think I'd work for What's His Face. That is it, isn't it?"

"I would let you go if you'd just stop being so untrustworthy."

"Oh, please. I'm not a saint but I've hardly been poisoning the food."

"That's the thing, though, Lily." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I know you were up to something."

"It's called trying to escape. It's generally what captive people try to do when you lock them up. I'm happy to give you the long and glorious history if you like."

"My crew told me you were leaving your bed at night. They tried to find you, but funnily enough, you were nowhere to be found."

She'd never been gone for very long periods of time in the library, rarely more than half an hour at a time. But apparently that was long enough.

"Then why didn't you say anything?" she said. "Or was it another trap?"

"It wasn't a trap, I was giving you the opportunity to prove I could trust you."

"I didn't violate your trust. I didn't do anything but sit by myself when I left bed," she said, which was technically true.

"You could've done that without hiding—however it is you're hiding, that is, I still don't know—but how can I think you weren't scheming when you didn't want us to know what you were doing?"

She didn't have a ready lie for that question, and if they were angry with her now, telling them that she'd been planning to sell information about the treasure they were after certainly wasn't going to help her position.

"So you're just going to hang onto me indefinitely," she said.

"No, I've actually found a solution."

"Which is?"

He reached into his vest and pulled out a small vial with a few drops of clear liquid inside. "My crew picked up some Veritaserum today. It'll solve the question of your background once and for all."

"Yes, but…."

She had acted deceptively, and she had very little important information to hide, besides her intent to sell information about the treasure. But if he was offering her the chance to prove that she was who she said she was, and if that would mean her freedom, she'd suffer through it. At least they'd know she was only planning to steal information from them, and not sabotage them entirely.

"All right," she said.

"Take that again?"

"Give it to me. I've got nothing to hide."

"You're awfully eager to tell the truth now that I've taken the option away from you."

"Look, obviously given the choice, I would prefer not to be on board. You lot are going—well, wherever you're going that's so secret. I want to be anywhere else. You think this potion will make you trust me? Give it to me and take me back to Oporto."

"Did I mention you're a pain in the arse?"

"I don't do what you want, I'm a pain in the arse. I offer to cooperate, I'm still a pain in the arse. You're clearly the pain in the arse among the two of us."

"You'll have to tell me where Sirius's wand is."

"You think I'm petty enough to pick annoying him over getting off your bloody ship?"

He pushed off the door with his shoulder. "I suppose."

Lily swallowed, ready to drink the potion, but he walked right past her. "Aren't you going to dose me?"

He wearily turned around. "Honestly, I'm about half asleep. You can prove yourself to me in the morning."

"I don't see why you're exhausted. I'm the one who did most of the work today."

"Trust me, I did plenty of walking myself." He yawned and headed for his cabin. "Good night."

"Not even a pillow?"

He opened the door to his room and Algernon sprang out, making an annoyed sound.

"Hey, there," James said, in a low, soothing voice.

But Algernon raced past him and over to Lily to wind his way around her shins. She reached down to stroke his back.

James leaned against his doorframe, barely keeping himself upright. "So much treachery today," he sighed.

"Go on, then," she told Algernon quietly. "He needs you."

Algernon meowed, but trotted over to James and followed him into his cabin. Lily almost gave up hope of a pillow, but then James reappeared and threw one at her with surprising accuracy. She couldn't catch it one-handed, though, and had to settle for blocking it from hitting her face.

"Thanks," she called, but he was shutting the door and she wasn't sure he heard her.

Sleeping on the floor was never pleasant, but the promise of pending freedom carried her off to sleep.

* * *

She awoke from her light doze with a start.

Someone was slowly turning the door handle from the main deck.

She didn't have weapons, save her body and the chairs, but she could shout for James. Annoyed as he was with her for escaping, he wouldn't let Sirius or Dorcas hurt her.

She quickly climbed into a crouch, moving her chained hand as little as possible.

The door opened one centimeter at a time, and Lily froze, unable to move without rattling her chains. She could hear the faint creak of wood under the person's feet, and the crashing of the waves against the ship in the distance.

Someone's shoulder slid through the gap in the door, followed by a head.

A head she didn't recognize.

The woman's face was turned back toward the deck as she slipped through the door, and Lily's body thrummed with tension. She cursed James for taking away her cutlass and leaving her unarmed when there were, apparently, other people trying to sneak onto his ship.

She would have to face this woman, though. In a second she'd see Lily and—

The woman's face turned in toward the library.

The clouds obscuring the moon made it impossible for Lily to make out her expression in great detail, but the little light that trickled in from the doorway revealed a thin face, mouth hung open a little in shock.

She and Lily stood, eyes locked on each other, for a tense moment.

And then they moved.

In the second it took the woman to step fully inside the room and raise her wand hand, Lily picked up the chair next to her. The woman was out of arm's reach, but not by much.

While Lily was in the process of swinging the chair at her head, Lily saw the woman's wand twitch and heard her utter a spell. Lily couldn't duck mid-swing, though, and she felt something rip along her side, a sharp, glancing blow that forced a gasp out of her.

Casting the spell cost the woman the second Lily needed: The woman's wand arm came up too late to properly stop the chair from banging into her head. Lily felt the reverberations as the legs connected with the woman's arm and head – not hard enough to knock her out, but enough to hurt her, at least a little.

"James!" Lily shouted.

The woman had recovered from her blow, swearing under her breath, and raised up her wand again. She shot off another spell and Lily dropped into a crouch.

But the spell went in another direction, flying over Lily's head.

Someone else cast a spell, and a flash of white light hurtled toward the woman from behind Lily, who turned to see the caster through the legs of the table.

James, of course, standing tall in his doorway.

Lily whipped her head back to the stranger, who'd pointed her wand at Lily again.

"I'll kill her," the woman said calmly.

"Then I'll kill you," James said. "Eye for an eye, and all that."

The stranger was watching James, apparently deeming Lily a non-threat.

Lily flicked her eyes around, trying to find another weapon. But she didn't need a weapon. She was close enough.

She shot her arm out, making a swipe for the woman's wand, but the woman was quicker. She fired off another spell at Lily, whose limbs stopped responding to her commands, her body immobilized in place with her hand outstretched.

Her face was frozen looking up at the woman, allowing her to see a red jet of light clip the stranger's shoulder. Lily caught the brief look of anger on her face before the woman collapsed in a heap on the ground, her wand rolling out of her hand and across the floor.

James had begun running toward the woman before she'd even hit the ground. When he reached her, ropes flew out from his wand to slither around her, binding her arms to her sides and her legs together.

Severus had told Lily about the jinx she suspected she was under, but he'd neglected to tell her how excruciatingly frustrating it was, how utterly helpless she felt sitting there unable to move. Now that the danger had passed, the slice along her side throbbed, but she couldn't do anything about it.

James bent down to grab the woman's wand where it had fallen, and then finally he turned to Lily. With a wave of his wand, her body relaxed, and she toppled backwards, her head whacking against the table.

"Shit," she said, sitting up and rubbing her scalp. No blood, from the feel of it, but it would probably bruise.

James let out a short laugh. "Couldn't have put it better myself." He stepped over the tied-up woman, pushed the library door all the way open, and stuck his head out to the main deck. He whistled twice and moved back inside to look at the stranger.

Lily stayed sitting on the ground, leaning back against the table, one hand pressed against her side. Her eyes stayed riveted on the fallen stranger, her heartbeat a sharp staccato, her body prepared for its attacker to rise up again at any moment.

Footsteps thudded on the main deck. Sirius appeared in the doorway, with Dorcas's head peeking out beside his shoulder. He stepped over the body, the candle in his hand illuminating the dark look on his face.

"Is this one of your mates?" he demanded of Lily.

"What's going on?" Marlene said, who'd joined Dorcas in the doorway. "Who's that?"

"I don't know," Lily said impatiently. "She walked into the library—"

"And Lily hit her with a chair," James said approvingly. "And then I Stupefied her."

Marlene moved around Dorcas to get a better look at the woman's face. "Where did she come from?"

Sirius turned on Marlene. "A bloody good question, McKinnon. Why didn't you see her going into the library?"

Marlene stood up and took a step backwards, running into Dorcas, who grumbled. "Er, that is…I may have…not been entirely awake."

"Marlene," said James, his voice low and dangerous. "Tell me you didn't fall asleep on watch."

"I'm _sorry_, all right? Obviously it was an accident! I was trying to stay awake but with our shifts all messed up from Oporto—"

"We'll talk about it later," he snapped. "And as for you two – Sirius and Dorcas, how did you not notice her sneaking around?"

"We were in the common room," Sirius said dismissively. "A chair broke and Dorcas was fixing it."

James was too busy looking at Sirius to catch Marlene's enormous eyeroll.

"Shit, Sirius, you couldn't have fixed it yourself?" James paced toward his bedroom door. "Dorcas, you were supposed to be on duty, not faffing about in the common room."

"Wasn't faffing," she muttered, arms folded.

"Merlin, you lot." James angrily ruffled his hair with one hand. "Can't believe none of you noticed she was on board."

"She must've snuck on after _she_," Sirius said, jerking his head down toward Lily, "saw fit to bludgeon me. Which is probably why she ran, to get you off the ship so this one could get on board."

"_What_?" Lily made to stand up, but her wound gaped, and she winced. "I left because I wanted to get away from you lot!"

"Oh, it was just coincidence that there was some witch hanging about in Oporto waiting to sneak on our ship? She had to have known we were coming."

"Did you check for a mark?" Dorcas asked James.

He shook his head, and she bent down to pull up the woman's sleeve.

In the faint light from Sirius's candle, Lily could see a stark black inking on the inner part of her forearm, a grotesque skull with a snake coming through the mouth.

James sighed. "I'm going to call Mad-Eye."

"You've got a friend called _Mad-Eye_?" Lily said, feeling a bit giddy. She pressed her hand down tighter on her side, which was sopping wet with something sticky, now that she thought about it. "Does he wear an eye patch, too?"

"Yes," Marlene said, and she sounded weird as she took a step toward Lily, "but the more noticeable thing is his peg leg."

"Pirates," Lily sighed. She leaned her head back against the table, mind drifting, imagining James with a peg leg to match his eye-patched cat. She laughed a little, and her mind tipped away from consciousness. "So predictable," she murmured, and she was lost.


	10. Still Not a Saboteur, Redux

**Chapter Ten – Still Not a Saboteur, Redux**

Lily groaned and rolled onto her side, hand drifting up to press against where she'd been injured. Her fingers settled on the unmistakable texture of gauze.

Sunlight streamed through the ladder hole leading up to the main deck, and she started to sit up, but winced and lay back down.

"Morning!" Marlene said from the spare bed next to Lily. She stood up, setting a piece of parchment on the cannon between them, and walked around to kneel by Lily. "Can I look?"

Lily's dress—or rather, Marlene's dress—had vanished, leaving only a blanket covering Lily.

Lily glanced around the room and, not seeing anyone else awake, nodded. Marlene pulled the blanket down Lily's torso, revealing a large piece of gauze stuck to the left side of Lily's abdomen. She gently peeled it off, drawing a hiss out of Lily, and set it aside.

"I'd be angry that my dress got ruined," Marlene said, brushing a finger over the sharp pink scar that ran along Lily's side, "but at least you tried to get revenge on the woman who did it."

"I hit her with a chair," Lily said, mostly to herself. "And she cast a spell at me."

"Yeah, nasty Slicing Hex there, but that's a nice clean cut, easy to take care of. The blood loss is what got you, though, and the shock. Drink this." Marlene offered her a vial out of her pocket.

Lily downed the potion, grimacing at the taste, and handed the vial back.

Marlene wandered over to her bed to dispose of it. The slight breeze from her walk knocked the letter balanced on the cannon askew, and it fluttered on top of Lily.

"I've left a few more potions with Caradoc that you should take when you eat breakfast," Marlene said.

Lily glanced at the messy writing covering the parchment, but moved it aside without reading it. Instead her fingers trailed along her scar, the skin slightly puckered, but cleaner than it ever would have healed naturally. "Thanks for fixing me up."

"Why wouldn't I?" Marlene rummaged through her trunk. "Mind, I'm not touching that Death Eater. She's got a nasty bruise from where you whacked her, but she can deal with it."

"Is that what her inking meant?"

"Yeah, that's You Know Who's mark. Puts it on people who've proven themselves to him."

"I don't have one."

"We did notice, actually." Marlene walked back over with a small jar in hand. "But that's not proof of much. Oh, sorry about that." She knelt down next to Lily and tucked the letter in her back pocket, smiling. "My brother wrote me some letters before we left – a new one opens up every week. Your scar doesn't hurt too badly, does it?"

Lily shook her head, and Marlene began smoothing a thick layer of paste onto Lily's scar.

"So, do you think…" Lily said. "Do you think I wanted that woman to get on board?"

"Do I?" Marlene snorted. "No. Does James? Probably not. Sirius and Dorcas—ugh, the two of them together."

"Well, then it's all back to the way it was before I left, then. Lovely."

"Except now we've got a real Death Eater to interrogate."

"I'm surprised I'm not still in irons."

"James said to take them off, and I wasn't going to argue."

"Bet Sirius did, though."

Marlene leaned in, inspecting Lily's wound, and sat back looking satisfied. "If we were still in Hogwarts, James might've listened to him, but these days…. Well, I think James is coming around to you."

"Because I got sliced open?"

"Because you hit that woman with a chair." Marlene placed fresh gauze over the paste and drew Lily's blanket back up.

"If I'd known hitting someone with a chair would've got him to trust me, I would've whacked Dorcas on day one."

"She wouldn't have let you get that far," James called from the ladder to the main deck. He let go and hopped down, skipping the last few rungs.

"It's okay," Marlene told Lily, "Dorcas has got a Deafening Charm on her right now."

James stopped at the foot of Lily's bed and smiled. "You're looking much better."

Lily raised an eyebrow. "Not bleeding all over everything is my best look."

"Can she come up to my cabin?" James asked Marlene. "I think we need to talk."

Marlene shrugged. "Whatever Lily wants."

"I can come," Lily said, even though lying curled up in a ball in bed sounded infinitely more appealing. "I just need clothing, preferably."

"Don't get dressed on my account," James said, "but I'll be waiting upstairs either way."

Lily managed to stand up all right, but Marlene had to help Lily with her undergarments and trousers, and Lily's side twinged when she stretched her arms up to pull on a shirt. Considering the size of her scar, though, there was remarkably little pain.

Properly attired, Lily slowly climbed the ladder. Moving her arms stretched out her side, enough to pull at her new skin, but she pressed on and pulled herself up to sit on the edge of the hole.

She paused for a moment to catch her breath, and that was probably a mistake, she realized, when the full force of the previous night's events washed over her.

She'd been attacked. She'd passed out from blood loss. She could have died, if it hadn't been for Marlene.

She'd thought, rather foolishly, that she'd reached her nadir when Caradoc had found her crying, but things could always get worse, and they had.

The Death Eater's shadowed face loomed in Lily's mind, and Lily swallowed hard. It was difficult to believe, with the sun shining brightly overhead, that she'd been in such dire straits only the night before. If it hadn't been for James—well, if it hadn't been for James, she wouldn't have been in that situation at all, but he'd still kept the Death Eater from killing her.

Her eyes prickled, but she hurriedly swiped her palms over them and climbed to her feet, her wound twinging. She could cry later, when she was alone, and then move her limbs simply because she had that freedom and she'd never fully appreciated that before, but right now she had to get James to give her Veritaserum so she could leave his bloody ship and get out of danger altogether.

Except.

She was no longer the biggest threat on the ship. Lily wasn't familiar with how much Veritaserum was needed to properly dose someone, but James hadn't had very much in that vial. It might have been enough for only one person.

It didn't take very long to play out the possibilities of how the Veritaserum could be used.

Lily nearly did cry at her conclusions, but she took a deep breath and marched through the library anyway. There was no use throwing a fit over things that couldn't be changed.

When she crossed the threshold, Algernon jumped out of James's lap and bounded over to her.

"I'd pet you," she said, "but I can't really reach down right now."

"He understands." James stood up from his alcoved bench next to the window, his eyes skimming from her head to her feet. "Er, why don't you lay down and I'll pull up a chair."

He tugged his blankets and pillows into a rough semblance of order and stepped aside with one arm spread to welcome her forward. She gingerly lowered herself onto his bed, smiling when Algernon hopped up next to her. He curled up in a ball by her side, and she stroked his ears, his head lolling back, pleased.

"How are you feeling?" James asked.

Pained, frustrated, desperate, lonely, confused.

"Fine," she said, her throat tight.

He folded his arms over his chest. "Good. That's…good."

Lily contented herself with petting Algernon while James paced back and forth next to her.

He stopped mid-step and sharply pivoted back toward her. "I'm sorry you got hurt. I mean, obviously I didn't know she was on board or I wouldn't have left you alone, but I'm still…sorry."

She forced a smile. "I'm fine. Really."

"I forget—I forget sometimes what this is like for you. You're not a member of my crew, and I—I should've asked if you were all right, but everyone else on this ship would never hesitate to report their injuries, and I forgot you don't know those protocols—"

"I was in shock," Lily said, with an air of finality. "I didn't even really know what she'd done."

"We should've treated you immediately—"

"Trust me, Marlene worked wonders." She glanced around the room, avoiding James's eyes. "Where's the Death Eater now?"

"Down in the magazine." James dragged a chair over from his table, the legs scraping against the wooden floor, and sat backwards on it, one hand absently ruffling his hair. "Restrained, warded. You don't need to worry about her."

And even though she knew where bringing it up would take her, she asked, "What did you want to talk about? I mean, since you've got to use the Veritaserum on your new prisoner instead of on me."

He gave her a wry smile. "So certain, are you?"

"It's only logical. There's no question that she's a threat. But if I am what I say I am, some random Muggle-born, then you gain nothing from interrogating me."

"But if you were a saboteur, you'd have more information. She was sent in with a strong likelihood of getting caught – you were supposed to worm your way into the crew."

"If I were a saboteur, that could be true, yes. But if I'm not—and for the hundredth time, I'm _not_—then you've wasted your opportunity." She tried to sit up, but gave up when the motion wrenched at her scar. "Do you think this woman would have hesitated to kill you, or your crew?"

"Definitely not."

"And what've I done? I roughed up Sirius, and that—I needed you to come out onto the deck, and you know how he is, and—my point is, I didn't kill you, or even really hurt Sirius too much. I didn't do anything to you, but I could have. You know I could have."

He tapped his fingers along his forearm and stood up to pace again. "Why did you need me to come out onto the deck? Don't tell me you missed me."

"I wanted my things back."

"What, your hairpin and a bit of money? Although—you must've had the hairpin, unless you found some other way out of the magazine…."

Lily looked down at Algernon. "Some of the items have sentimental value."

James stopped in front of the windows, his hands behind his back. He didn't say anything for a moment, just stood there with his head tilted.

"What did you hit Sirius with, anyway?" he asked.

"A cannonball."

He laughed, sharp and hollow, and resumed his pacing. "I suppose we've plenty of those lying around."

"Please tell me you're not going to waste your Veritaserum on me. You can't risk your crew's safety like that. Or yours."

He regarded her strangely.

"Look," she said. "I don't _have_ real secrets. My surname, probably, and that's it. You're a pirate – always on the hunt for a new opportunity, right? Surely you can see you've got better opportunities with that woman than with me."

James stopped near the end of the bed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "And there it is," he said, readjusting his glasses. "How can you—I'm not—we've got a problem, you know."

"Obviously. God knows why, but for some reason What's His Face has sent his Death Eaters after a bunch of pirates. I assume you stole from him?"

He gave an exasperated sigh and swung the chair around to sit in it properly. "All right, Lily. I need to ask you: do we _look_ like pirates?"

"I don't think anyone _looks_ like a pirate unless they have a peg leg and a talking parrot. I assumed you traded out the parrot for a cat."

"Algernon's only on board because he insisted," James corrected. "But no. That's not…. What makes you think I'm a pirate?"

"You told me as much."

"But before that. Before you came on my ship."

"Oh. I saw a wanted poster, in Brighton. It had your face on it, said you were wanted for piracy."

Comprehension dawned on James's face. "_Those_ things. And here I'd laughed them off."

"What?"

He strode across the room, flipped through some parchments in a desk drawer, and brought one back to Lily. "I kept one for myself," he said, holding it out. "Thought it was funny, really."

She took the poster and glanced over it. "Why would being wanted for piracy be funny?" She handed it back to him, and he set it on the table behind him. "People are hanged for that."

James shrugged and sat down. "It's just You Know Who trying to find me. They're not—we're not pirates, Lily."

"That sounds like something a pirate would say."

He raised his eyebrows.

He could deadpan with the best of them, but he didn't—

He wasn't joking.

Oh, the _bastard_.

Lily bolted upright in his bed, ignoring the spike of pain in her side. "I _parleyed_ with you."

"And?"

She whipped his pillow at his head, but he caught it with both hands. "You complete and utter _arse_."

"_You_ tried to steal from _me_." He let the pillow drop onto the ground.

"Because I thought you were pirates!"

"Well, we're not. You Know Who put those up because—he didn't like what I was doing."

The worst part was, even though James had lied to her, it wouldn't have mattered. She'd snuck on board and initially acted without him lying to her. That was all on her.

Her whole predicament would have happened regardless of James's lie.

She huffed. "This is ridiculous. I can't imagine why What's His Face would care about you."

"Oi, I'm a proper threat to him, I'll have you know."

"Well, clearly I've got the wrong end of the stick about What's His Face, if he's terrified of a boy with a ship."

"You think so little of me, do you?"

"Why shouldn't I? You're—" A pirate, she'd been about to say, but that wasn't true, as it turned out. "You've given me no reason to think better of you."

"You were perfectly willing to believe I was enough of a threat to the Royal Navy to have a wanted poster, but now you don't think I can scare the pants off of You Know Who?"

"Exactly."

"Well, fair enough, I'm sure he's not _personally_ terrified of me. His pants are likely well in place. But he doesn't like what I've done, or what I could do."

"Like what, talk his cats into betraying him?"

He laughed and shook his head. "No, nothing like that. What, you think I've been mucking about the last two years, letting him have everything without a fight?"

"What else was I supposed to think? You told me you were a _pirate_."

A smile played at the corners of his lips. "You really believed me, didn't you?"

"Strangely, I don't usually doubt people who claim to be pirates. And besides, your cat had an eye patch. I'd seen your poster. Why shouldn't I have thought you were a pirate?"

"I'm glad I was so believable."

She scoffed. "Of the two of us, _you're_ the one who's been lying about who he is."

Algernon stepped across her stomach, paws delicately avoiding her wound, and hopped off the bed to sit next to James.

"It was for your protection," James said. "If we let you go right away, I thought it would be better for everyone if you didn't actually know who we were. If you just thought you'd met some magical pirates, no one would try to interrogate you about what you'd seen and heard on board, and you wouldn't be—hurt."

"I'd say that's paranoid but then I've got a lovely new scar."

"Right. So. I thought it made sense."

"Of course you did. You're a lunatic."

He laughed, short and quiet. "I suppose I can take that eye patch off now, Algernon. Your part in my ruse is over."

He gently pried the eye patch off, and Algernon shook his head, blinking profusely, and leaped back onto the bed with Lily.

"That was just for show?" Lily asked.

"Well, I thought it was funny. And he'd just annoyed me, and then I didn't want to break the ruse, so…."

"I can't believe you made your cat wander around with one eye for more than a week just to convince me you were a pirate."

"I'm a very committed person, especially to ruses," he said solemnly. "But there's no need for it anymore."

"Does that mean you believe me when I say who I am now? Did my chair bashing and gullibility convince you?"

He nodded, standing up to pace again. "The final spell in the ward. I wouldn't—that wouldn't be my first thought, using a chair. And after seeing how you escaped yesterday…."

"Running away made you think I was Muggle-born?"

"No, that's to be expected, like you said. But you didn't take off my Tracking Charm, even though you had a wand."

"I didn't—when did you cast that on me?"

He turned back to her and frowned. "When you were in the water."

"The spell hit the water, I thought."

"Well, it did, but that doesn't stop the spell. It's not a wall. Light can move through water, at least if it's really shallow."

"Oh," Lily said sourly. "So I could've run all day and you would've found me."

"That's exactly what happened, if you recall. I lost my whole day in Oporto following you."

"If you're expecting an apology, I hear they'll be all the rage two centuries from now."

He almost smiled, but not quite. "Thought as much."

At least her escape attempt had had some benefit. He believed her now, finally. That was something. Too bad it wouldn't get her on land anytime soon.

"But I'm afraid," he said, "that I can't really fulfill the terms of our parley for a while. It'll be another month on board at least. We've got business to take care of before I can take you back to Portugal."

If Lily hadn't already concluded that herself before entering his cabin, she might've been outraged, or at least annoyed. Instead she bit back a sigh. The thought of a month on James's ship wouldn't have stung nearly as much if she hadn't thrown herself at him two days earlier, or if he hadn't looked so damned apologetic over having to keep her around. He'd wanted her on board, once, and spending weeks with him, knowing he wasn't interested….

But a month wasn't forever, she told herself, in a pitiful attempt to cheer herself up. She could read for a couple weeks and try to get other passage out of the Azores.

He was still watching her for a response, so she nodded, not looking at him.

"You feeling all right?" he asked.

"Marlene has some potions for me somewhere," she said vaguely.

"Then you should go take them. I've got to prepare to interrogate our prisoner."

Algernon headbutted Lily's chest when she sat up, and she stroked the softer fur on his head.

"I think you would've protected me last night if you could have," she told Algernon.

He let out a long, low purr.

Lily laughed, and caught James smiling at her, pleased and affectionate. He might've turned her down the other night, and she'd been stupid over men before, but she wasn't imagining the way he looked at her.

Maybe the weeks ahead wouldn't be so awful, if he believed her, and smiled at her.

She memorized the tilt of his mouth like that, and left him with Algernon in his cabin.

* * *

She managed to cross the library and the deck without too much pain, and found Marlene in the common room enjoying a late breakfast.

Lily sat down across the table from her. "You _liar_."

"Hrm?" Marlene said, mouth full of bread.

"You're not pirates at all."

Marlene swallowed her food and exhaled deeply. "Oh, thank Merlin that's over."

"Why did you go along with that stupid farce? I expect that sort of thing from James, now, but the rest of you…."

Marlene shrugged. "He figured you calling us pirates was a ruse, in which case he thought it'd be fun to play along, or he thought you really believed it, in which case he thought it'd be fun to play along."

"And you said all right, let's do it?"

"Well. Sirius and Remus persuaded us it would be a good idea."

"Sirius I can see, but Remus?"

"James—" Marlene's eyes flicked toward the door. "He's had a hard time of it lately, and he hasn't—he hasn't been himself. When he said he wanted to play at pirates—we couldn't say no. That's something the old James would have done, at Hogwarts."

"And you lot would do anything for him."

"Because he'd do anything for us. I mean, with Remus on the full moon, he and the others—well, that's James's secret."

"He told me they do spells in there."

"Right. Well, there's that, and then…. We were partnered together in Arithmancy one term. I was really upset one day because the professor had said something about our essay – he didn't mean it to be cruel, but I took it a bit hard, and James charmed his chair to buck him out of it whenever he tried to sit down. He's just—he's our captain. We agreed to that when we signed on, to listen to him, and we do. Sirius less than others, but that's them, though."

"Still don't know why you all had to lie to me," Lily muttered.

"Lily," Marlene said sternly, "you are _not_ allowed to be angry with me for lying when you did nothing but lie to me when we first met."

"That was because—I thought you were pirates, and I didn't—that's just what I do, Marlene."

Marlene gave her one last sharp look, and then relented. "I don't like what you do, but I still thought you seemed nice. I thought it was strange, that someone so nice would be doing that."

"Life's a funny thing." Lily gave her a rueful smile. "But thanks for not holding that against me. I really haven't lied to you since."

"I did take all your belongings?"

"Yes. James is just crap at security."

"Oh, please tell him that. _Please_. As a favor to your friend, Marlene, who really needs to put James in his place after last night."

"What happened last night wasn't your fault."

"Well, not entirely. Dorcas should have been out there working, but she was—" Marlene stopped herself and looked down at her plate.

"You don't think…."

"I'm not saying anything."

"But Sirius was—he wouldn't need help fixing a broken _chair_—"

"Not a _word_."

Lily slanted a smile at her. "Yes, Healer."

The door swung open and Remus's head poked through, looking a bit ill. "We're going to interrogate the Death Eater. Marlene, can you take care of the tacking for a bit?"

"Of course!"

"You're wonderful. Thank you. Lily, I'm terribly sorry to hear about you getting attacked by Death Eaters."

"I'm terribly sorry to hear that you lot have been _pretending_ to be pirates."

"Ah. Yes. Are we finally done with that ruse, then?"

"Fortunately, yes."

"That's how I prefer it. Well, rest up."

"Planning on it."

Remus ducked out of the door, closing it behind him.

Marlene slid her chair back. "That's me, then."

Lily followed her out of the common room while Marlene went on about how asinine it was to pretend to be pirates, but she hesitated by the ladder to the gun deck.

Marlene kept walking, pausing only when she saw Lily wasn't next to her anymore. "Oh, right, you should sleep," she said. "But first go find Caradoc and get some breakfast and potions in you."

"Right," Lily said absently. "D'you think they'd let me watch the interrogation?"

"Why would you….I mean, I dunno."

"Curiosity."

"Probably not. They've got—you don't know everything yet, I don't think."

"No," Lily sighed. "It's really apparent that I don't."

* * *

Lily had fallen into a light doze, her empty plate at the foot of her bed, when she heard someone climbing up from the orlop deck.

She sat up, wincing, and saw James storming down toward her. He was halfway across the deck before Sirius's head popped up through the ladder hole.

"James," Sirius called. "Prongs."

James whirled around, his arms stiff at his sides, his fists clenched. "Fuck!"

"Hold on, all right?" Sirius climbed off the ladder.

"Is everything okay?" Lily asked.

Remus came up behind Sirius, and they both walked toward James like they were approaching a wild animal.

"James," Remus said soothingly, "that's all she knows."

James's hand tore through his hair as he paced back and forth. Lily tried to catch Remus's eye for some explanation, but he was entirely focused on James.

"That's what they said would be useful," Remus continued. "It might very well be – we don't have enough information to judge the value—"

James spun to the side and viciously kicked one of the cannons, his boot connecting with a dull clang. "_Shit_!"

Sirius reached out to steady James's shoulder as he hopped on one foot. "Idiot."

"I'll go get Marlene," Remus sighed. He made for the ladder to the main deck while Sirius helped lower James onto the spare bed across from Lily.

James delicately stretched out his leg and grimaced. "All right, in hindsight, I'm willing to concede I shouldn't have kicked that cannon."

Sirius stood back and folded his arms. "And next you'll learn that things don't stop existing once they're out of sight. Well done, indeed, Captain Potter."

"What happened?" Lily ventured.

Sirius didn't even look at her. "Stay out of it."

"Fuck, Sirius, would you let up already?" James said. "She's not a bloody Death Eater."

"You don't know that."

"And you don't know she is, so shut it."

"Wasted our Veritaserum," Sirius muttered, with a sharp glance at Lily. "Knew we shouldn't have used it on that one."

"Ask me anything, Sirius," Lily said savagely. "What are you so desperate to know about me? Am I that threatening? My inability to know if someone's cast a spell on me? Real danger, that. Or maybe you're just sore that I beat you."

"That wasn't a fair fight."

"If I understand things correctly, you should be used to that."

Sirius's gaze dropped back to James. "What did you tell her?"

James was cradling his toe and pointedly didn't look up.

"Oh, for God's sake, Sirius," Lily said. "He barely told me anything. None of you do – I'm an open book compared to the rest of you."

Marlene almost slid down the ladder from the main deck and hurried over to kneel in front of James. "James _Potter_, stop hurting yourself!"

By now James's face had taken a turn toward green. Lily watched him curiously – he hadn't kicked his foot _that_ hard.

"Let me just—" Marlene pulled out her wand and murmured a spell against his shoe. "Nothing serious, at least. Give me a moment. You might want to lie down for this, and hold onto something."

James nodded, the lines in his throat bobbing as he swallowed. Marlene eased his shoe off, and he let out a long, thin hiss.

"Such a baby," she muttered, and cast a line of blue light at his foot.

James swore under his breath.

"That's it." Marlene stood up. "I've got to take care of some things Dorcas asked me to do before she wakes up."

"In a minute," he said quietly, climbing to his feet. He stepped lightly on his newly Healed foot, and then again with his full weight. "I need to see you in my cabin."

"Oh," she said, voice sinking. "Right. 'Course."

"It won't take long. Come on."

Marlene sullenly followed him to the ladder and climbed up after him.

Sirius seemed stuck in place, a strange look on his face.

"You'd make an excellent pirate," Lily told him. "You're certainly ruthless enough."

He snapped out of his daze and threw her a disdainful look. "You'd know better than I."

Lily opened her mouth to reply, but he simply turned and strode over to the ladder. He wasn't halfway up before Lily was on her feet.

Whatever potion Marlene had given her with breakfast had worked wonders – her side ached half as much as it had when she'd first woken up. She still took her time on the ladder, but soon enough she joined Sirius and Remus in the library.

Sirius glared at her. "You're not welcome here."

"Fuck off," Lily said easily, and lowered herself into a seat at the table.

"I don't think he'll be too hard on her," Remus said. "It's partially my fault the shift schedule got so irregular—"

Sirius spun toward Remus. "Not another word. It's not your fault in any way."

"I didn't think until now—could the Death Eater have cast a spell on Marlene?"

"How could the Death Eater have cast it unless Marlene wasn't watching?"

Remus sighed and leaned his elbows on the table.

"What are you going to do with…the woman below deck?" Lily asked.

"It's up to James," Remus said, "and, well—other people."

James slipped out from his cabin with his mouth fixed in a grim line. He sank down into the chair next to Remus and propped his head up with one hand threaded through his hair.

"Death Eaters got Marlene's family," James said in a low voice. "All of them."

Remus's head snapped up toward the door to James's cabin, as though he could see her through the wall. "Marlene," he said softly, although he didn't seem aware that he'd spoken.

Sirius blinked. "Fuck."

Lily's vision went a bit blurry as a few tears sprung up, and she blinked them away. "Shit," she said, because there was nothing else to say.

"Mad-Eye told me earlier," James said miserably, "and I thought—I thought our Death Eater might know something—but she had nothing—_fuck_." He sat up and banged a fist on the table.

No one seemed quite sure what else to do, or say. There was nothing that could make Marlene feel better, nothing that could ease the sudden, wrenching transition to being an orphan.

Lily's heart ached for Marlene, sharp and raw.

"Remus," James said quietly. "I can't help but notice you're still here."

"Yes. I am."

They shared a brief look that Lily couldn't interpret.

"Right," James sighed. "Of course. Well, in that case, you should go in, Lily."

"Sorry, what?"

"Go in there. She likes you."

"I—I just met her."

"She needs _someone_. You think I should send in Dorcas?"

Lily nearly laughed at the flabbergasted version of Dorcas that appeared in her head when asked to comfort someone.

"Men," she said under her breath, and marched over to knock gently on the door. "Marlene?"

No one answered.

"Marlene, it's Lily. Can I come in?"

But still Marlene said nothing. No sounds penetrated the door, not even Algernon's meowing. Lily tried the handle, but it didn't budge.

"Did you lock it?" she asked James.

"No," James said slowly. He joined her at the door and wiggled the handle. "She's locked us out?"

Lily squeezed her eyes shut, pushing back the hint of tears that had prickled up. "She shouldn't have to be alone in there."

"But that's what she wants," Remus said.

Lily stared at the dark door blocking Marlene off from her friends for a long moment, then reluctantly sat back down at the table, feeling horrendously hollow.

"Well," James said, sinking back into a chair, "that can't be good."


End file.
